Heart of Darkness

HEART OF DARKNESS

By

JOSEPH CONRAD

Author of " The Children of the Sea, "
"Lord Jim, " " Typhoon, "
&c, &c.

GARDEN CITY, NEW YORK
DOUBLED AY, PAGE & COMPANY

1916

rfjU4Ju„:> u^iuil r'ujjiitJCiuiij

2012

HEART OF DARKNESS

I

THE Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor without a
flutter of the sails, and was at rest. The flood had made, the wind
was nearly calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing
for it was to come to and wait for the turn of the tide.

The sea-reach of die Thames stretched before us like the
beginning of an interminable, waterway. In the offing the sea and
die sky were welded togedier without a joint, and in die luminous
space the tanned sails of the barges drifting up widi the tide
seemed to stand still in red clusters of canvas sharply peaked, with
gleams of varnished sprits. A haze rested on the low shores that
ran out to sea in vanishing flatness. The air was dark above
Gravesend, and fardier back still seemed condensed into a
mournful gloom, brooding motionless over die biggest, and the
greatest, town on earth.

The Director of Companies was our captain and our host. We
four affectionately watched his back as he stood in the bows
looking to seaward. On the whole river diere was nothing that
looked half so nautical. He resembled a pilot, which to a seaman
is trustworthiness personified. It was difficult to realize his work
was not out diere in the luminous estuary, but behind him, within
the brooding gloom.

Between us diere was, as I have already said somewhere, the
bond of the sea. Besides holding our hearts together through long
periods of separation, it had die effect of making us tolerant of
each other's yarns— and even convictions. The Lawyer— the best of
old fellows— had, because of his many years and many virtues, the
only cushion on deck, and was lying on the only rug. The
Accountant had brought out already a box of dominoes, and w r as
toying architecturally with the bones. Marlow sat cross-legged right
aft, leaning against die mizzen-mast. He had sunken cheeks, a
yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and, with his
arms dropped, die palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol.
The Director, satisfied the anchor had good hold, made his way
aft and sat down amongst us. We exchanged a few words lazily.
Afterwards there was silence on board die yacht. For some reason
or otiier w r e did not begin that game of dominoes. We felt medi-
tative, and fit for nothing but placid staring. The day was ending in
a serenity of still and exquisite brilliance. The water shone
pacifically; the sky, without a speck, w r as a benign immensity of
unstained light; die very mist on the Essex marshes was like a
gauzy and radiant fabric, hung from the wooded rises inland, and
draping the low shores in diaphanous folds. Only the gloom to the

west, brooding over the upper reaches, became more somber
every minute, as if angered by the approach of the sun.

And at last, in its curved and imperceptible fall, the sun sank
low, and from glowing white changed to a dull red without rays
and without heat, as if about to go out suddenly, stricken to death
by the touch of that gloom brooding over a crowd of men.

Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the serenity
became less brilliant but more profound. The old river in its
broad reach rested unruffled at the decline of day, after ages of
good sendee done to the race that peopled its banks, spread out in
the tranquil dignity of a waterway leading to the uttermost ends of
the earth. We looked at the venerable stream not in the vivid flush
of a short day that comes and departs for ever, but in the august
light of abiding memories. And indeed nothing is easier for a man
who has, as the phrase goes, "followed the sea" with reverence and
affection, than to evoke the great spirit of the past upon the lower
reaches of the Thames. The tidal current runs to and fro in its
unceasing sendee, crowded with memories of men and ships it
had borne to the rest of home or to the battles of the sea. It had
known and served all the men of whom the nation is proud, from
Sir Francis Drake to Sir John Franklin, knights all, titled and un-
titled— the great knights-errant of the sea. It had borne all the ships
whose names are like jewels flashing in the night of time, from the
Golden Hind returning with her round flanks full of treasure, to
be visited by die Queen's Highness and thus pass out of the
gigantic tale, to the Erebus and Terror, bound on other
conquests— and tiiat never returned. It had known the ships and
the men. They had sailed from Deptford, from Greenwich, from
Erith— die adventurers and die setders; kings' ships and the ships
of men on 'Change; captains, admirals, the dark "interlopers" of
the Eastern trade, and the commissioned "generals" of East India
fleets. Hunters for gold or pursuers of fame, diey all had gone out
on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch, messengers
of die might within the land, bearers of a spark from die sacred
fire. What greatness had not floated on die ebb of diat river into
die mystery of an unknown earth! . . . The dreams of men, the
seed of commonwealdis, the germs of empires.

The sun set; die dusk fell on die stream, and lights began to
appear along the shore. The Chapman lighthouse, a three-legged
thing erect on a mud-flat, shone strongly. Lights of ships moved in
the fairway— a great stir of lights going up and going down. And
farther west on the upper reaches the place of the monstrous town
was still marked ominously on the sky, a brooding gloom in
sunshine, a lurid glare under the stars.

"And this also," said Marlow suddenly, "has been one of the
dark places of die earth."

He was die only man of us who still "followed the sea." The

worst that could be said of him was tiiat he did not represent his
class. He was a seaman, but he was a wanderer too, while most
seamen lead, if one may so express it, a sedentary life. Their
minds are of the stay-at-home order, and their home is always with
them— the ship; and so is their country— the sea. One ship is very
much like another, and the sea is always the same. In the
immutability of their surroundings the foreign shores, the foreign
faces, the changing immensity of life, glide past, veiled not by a
sense of mystery but by a slightly disdainful ignorance; for there is
nothing mysterious to a seaman unless it be the sea itself, which is
the mistress of his existence and as inscrutable as Destiny. For the
rest, after his hours of work, a casual stroll or a casual spree on
shore suffices to unfold for him the secret of a whole continent,
and generally he finds the secret not worth knowing. The yarns of
seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning of which lies
within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not typical (if his
propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the meaning of
an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside, enveloping die
tale which brought it out only as a glow r brings out a haze, in the
likeness of one of diese misty halos that sometimes are made
visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.

His remark did not seem at all surprising. It was just like
Marlow r . It was accepted in silence. No one took the trouble to
grunt even; and presendy he said, very slow r —

"I was thinking of very old times, when the Romans first came
here, nineteen hundred years ago— die odier day. . . . Light came
out of this river since— you say Knights? Yes; but it is like a
running blaze on a plain, like a flash of lightning in the clouds. We
live in the flicker— may it last as long as the old earth keeps rolling!
But darkness was here yesterday. Imagine the feelings of a
commander of a fine— what d'ye call 'em?— trireme in the
Mediterranean, ordered suddenly to die north; run overland
across the Gauls in a hurry; put in charge of one of diese craft the
legionaries,— a wonderful lot of handy men they must have been
too— used to build, apparendy by the hundred, in a month or two,
if we may believe what we read. Imagine him here— the very end of
the world, a sea the color of lead, a sky the color of smoke, a kind
of ship about as rigid as a concertina— and going up this river with
stores, or orders, or what you like. Sandbanks, marshes, forests,
savages,— precious little to eat fit for a civilized man, nothing but
Thames water to drink. No Falernian wine here, no going ashore.
Here and diere a military camp lost in a wilderness, like a needle
in a bundle of hay— cold, fog, tempests, disease, exile, and death,—
death skulking in the air, in die water, in the bush. They must
have been dying like flies here. Oh yes— he did it. Did it very well,
too, no doubt, and widiout diinking much about it either, except
afterwards to brag of what he had gone dirough in his time,

perhaps. They were men enough to face the darkness. And
perhaps he was cheered by keeping his eye on a chance of
promotion to die fleet at Ravenna by-and-by, if he had good
friends in Rome and survived the awful climate. Or diink of a
decent young citizen in a toga— perhaps too much dice, you
know— coming out here in die train of some prefect, or tax-
gatherer, or trader even, to mend his fortunes. Land in a swamp,
march dirough die woods, and in some inland post feel the
savagery, the utter savagery, had closed round him,— all that
mysterious life of die wilderness diat stirs in the forest, in the
jungles, in the hearts of wild men. There's no initiation either into
such mysteries. He has to live in the midst of the
incomprehensible, which is also detestable. And it has a
fascination, too, that goes to work upon him. The fascination of
the abomination— you know. Imagine die growing regrets, the
longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate."

He paused.

"Mind," he began again, lifting one arm from die elbow, the
palm of die hand outwards, so that, with his legs folded before
him, he had the pose of a Buddha preaching in European clothes
and without a lotus-flower— "Mind, none of us would feel exacdy
like this. What saves us is efficiency— die devotion to efficiency.
But these chaps were not much account, really. They were no
colonists; dieir administration was merely a squeeze, and nothing
more, I suspect. They were conquerors, and for that you want
only brute force— nothing to boast of, when you have it, since your
strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others.
They grabbed what they could get for die sake of what was to be
got. It was just robbery with violence, aggravated murder on great
scale, and men going at it blind— as is very proper for those who
tackle a darkness. The conquest of the earth, which mostly means
the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or
slightly flater noses than ourselves, is not a pretty tiling when you
look into it too much. What redeems it is the idea only. An idea at
the back of it; not a sentimental pretense but an idea; and an
unselfish belief in the idea— something you can set up, and bow
down before, and offer a sacrifice to. . . ."

He broke off. Flames glided in the river, small green flames,
red flames, white flames, pursuing, overtaking, joining, crossing
each other— then separating slowly or hastily. The traffic of the
great city went on in the deepening night upon the sleepless river.
We looked on, waiting patiently— there was nothing else to do till
the end of the flood; but it was only after a long silence, when he
said, in a hesitating voice, "I suppose you fellows remember I did
once turn fresh-water sailor for a bit," that we knew we were fated,
before the ebb began to run, to hear about one of Marlow's
inconclusive experiences.

"I don't want to bother you much with what happened to me
personally," he began, showing in this remark die weakness of
many tellers of tales who seem so often unaware of what their
audience would best like to hear; "yet to understand die effect of it
on me you ought to know how I got out there, what I saw, how I
went up that river to the place where I first met the poor chap. It
was die fardiest point of navigation and die culminating point of
my experience. It seemed somehow to throw a kind of light on
everything about me— and into my dioughts. It was somber enough
too— and pitiful— not extraordinary in any way— not very clear
either. No, not very clear. And yet it seemed to throw a kind of
light.

"I had then, as you remember, just returned to London after a
lot of Indian Ocean, Pacific, China Seas— a regular dose of the
East— six years or so, and I was loafing about, hindering you
fellows in your work and invading your homes, just as diough I
had got a heavenly mission to civilize you. It was very fine for a
time, but after a bit I did get tired of resting. Then I began to look
for a ship— I should think the hardest work on eardi. But the ships
wouldn't even look at me. And I got tired of diat game too.

"Now when I was a little chap I had a passion for maps. I
would look for hours at South America, or Africa, or Australia,
and lose myself in all die glories of exploration. At that time there
were many blank spaces on the earth, and when I saw one that
looked particularly inviting on a map (but they all look that) I
would put my finger on it and say, When I grow up I will go there.
The North Pole was one of these places, I remember. Well, I
haven't been there yet, and shall not try now. The glamour's off.
Other places were scattered about the Equator, and in ever}' sort
of latitude all over the two hemispheres. I have been in some of
them, and . . . well, we won't talk about that. But there was one
yet— die biggest, the most blank, so to speak— that I had a
hankering after.

"True, by this time it was not a blank space any more. It had
got filled since my boyhood with rivers and lakes and names. It
had ceased to be a blank space of delightful mystery— a white patch
for a boy to dream gloriously over. It had become a place of
darkness. But there was in it one river especially, a mighty big
river, that you could see on die map, resembling an immense
snake uncoiled, with its head in die sea, its body at rest curving
afar over a vast country, and its tail lost in the depths of the land.
And as I looked at the map of it in a shop-window, it fascinated
me as a snake would a bird— a silly little bird. Then I remembered
there was a big concern, a Company for trade on that river. Dash
it all! I thought to myself, they can't trade without using some kind
of craft on that lot of fresh water— steamboats! Why shouldn't I try
to get charge of one. I went on along Fleet Street, but could not

shake off die idea. The snake had charmed me.

"You understand it was a Continental concern, that Trading
society; but I have a lot of relations living on the Continent,
because it's cheap and not so nasty as it looks, they say.

"I am sorry to own I began to worry them. This was already a
fresh departure for me. I was not used to get tilings that way, you
know. I always went my own road and on my own legs where I
had a mind to go. I wouldn't have believed it of myself; but, then—
you see— I felt somehow I must get there by hook or by crook. So
I worried them. The men said 'My dear fellow,' and did nothing.
Then— would you believe it?— I tried the women. I, Charlie
Marlow, set the women to work— to get a job. Heavens! Well, you
see, the notion drove me. I had an aunt, a dear enthusiastic soul.
She wrote: 'It will be delightful. I am ready to do anything, any-
thing for you. It is a glorious idea. I know the wife of a very high
personage in the Administration, and also a man who has lots of
influence with,' &c, &c. She was determined to make no end of
fuss to get me appointed skipper of a river steamboat, if such was
my fancy.

"I got my appointment— of course; and I got it very quick. It
appears the Company had received news that one of their captains
had been killed in a scuffle with the natives. This was my chance,
and it made me the more anxious to go. It was only months and
months afterwards, when I made the attempt to recover what was
left of the body, that I heard the original quarrel arose from a
misunderstanding about some hens. Yes, two black hens.
Fresleven— that was the fellow's name, a Dane— thought himself
wronged somehow in the bargain, so he went ashore and started to
hammer die chief of the village with a stick. Oh, it didn't surprise
me in the least to hear this, and at die same time to be told diat
Fresleven was die gendest, quietest creature that ever walked on
two legs. No doubt he was; but he had been a couple of years
already out there engaged in the noble cause, you know, and he
probably felt die need at last of asserting his self-respect in some
way. Therefore he whacked the old nigger mercilessly, while a big
crowd of his people watched him, diunderstruck, till some man,— I
was told die chiefs son,— in desperation at hearing the old chap
yell, made a tentative jab with a spear at the white man— and of
course it went quite easy between die shoulder-blades. Then the
whole population cleared into die forest, expecting all kinds of
calamities to happen, while, on the other hand, the steamer
Fresleven commanded left also in a bad panic, in charge of the
engineer, I believe. Afterwards nobody seemed to trouble much
about Fresleven's remains, till I got out and stepped into his shoes.
I couldn't let it rest, though; but when an opportunity offered at
last to meet my predecessor, die grass growing through his ribs was
tall enough to hide his bones. They were all diere. The

supernatural being had not been touched after he fell. And the
village was deserted, the huts gaped black, rotting, all askew within
the fallen enclosures. A calamity had come to it, sure enough. The
people had vanished. Mad terror had scattered them, men,
women, and children, through the bush, and they had never
returned. What became of the hens I don't know either. I should
think die cause of progress got them, anyhow. However, tiirough
this glorious affair I got my appointment, before I had fairly begun
to hope for it.

"I flew around like mad to get ready, and before forty-eight
hours I was crossing the Channel to show myself to my employers,
and sign the contract. In a very few hours I arrived in a city that
always makes me think of a whited sepulcher. Prejudice no doubt.
I had no difficulty in finding the Company's offices. It was die
biggest thing in die town, and everybody I met was full of it. They
were going to run an over-sea empire, and make no end of coin by
trade.

"A narrow and deserted street in deep shadow, high houses,
innumerable windows with Venetian blinds, a dead silence, grass
sprouting between the stones, imposing carriage archways right
and left, immense double doors standing ponderously ajar. I
slipped through one of these cracks, went up a swept and
ungarnished staircase, as arid as a desert, and opened die first
door I came to. Two women, one fat and the other slim, sat on
straw-bottomed chairs, knitting black wool. The slim one got up
and walked straight at me— still knitting with downcast eyes— and
only just as I began to think of getting out of her way, as you would
for a somnambulist, stood still, and looked up. Her dress was as
plain as an umbrella-cover, and she turned round without a word
and preceded me into a waiting-room. I gave my name, and
looked about. Deal table in die middle, plain chairs all round the
walls, on one end a large shining map, marked with all die colors
of a rainbow. There was a vast amount of red— good to see at any
time, because one knows that some real work is done in there, a
deuce of a lot of blue, a little green, smears of orange, and, on the
East Coast, a purple patch, to show where die jolly pioneers of
progress drink the jolly lager-beer. However, I wasn't going into
any of these. I was going into die yellow. Dead in die center. And
die river was die re— fascinating— deadly — like a snake. Ough! A
door opened, a white-haired secretarial head, but wearing a
compassionate expression, appeared, and a skinny forefinger
beckoned me into the sanctuary. Its light was dim, and a heavy
writing-desk squatted in the middle. From behind that structure
came out an impression of pale plumpness in a frock-coat. The
great man himself. He was five feet six, I should judge, and had his
grip on die handle -end of ever so many millions. He shook hands,
I fancy, murmured vaguely, was satisfied with my French. Bon

voyage.

"In about forty-five seconds I found myself again in the
waiting-room with the compassionate secretary, who, full of
desolation and sympathy, made me sign some document. I believe
I undertook amongst other things not to disclose any trade secrets.
Well, I am not going to.

"I began to feel slightly uneasy. You know I am not used to
such ceremonies, and there was something ominous in the
atmosphere. It was just as though I had been let into some
conspiracy— I don't know— something not quite right; and I was
glad to get out. In the outer room the two women knitted black
wool feverishly. People were arriving, and the younger one was
walking back and forth introducing them. The old one sat on her
chair. Her flat cloth slippers were propped up on a foot-warmer,
and a cat reposed on her lap. She wore a starched white affair on
her head, had a wart on one cheek, and silver-rimmed spectacles
hung on the tip of her nose. She glanced at me above the glasses.
The swift and indifferent placidity of that look troubled me. Two
youths with foolish and cheery countenances were being piloted
over, and she threw at them the same quick glance of
unconcerned wisdom. She seemed to know all about them and
about me too. An eerie feeling came over me. She seemed
uncanny and fateful. Often far away there I thought of these two,
guarding the door of Darkness, knitting black wool as for a warm
pall, one introducing, introducing continuously to the unknown,
the other scrutinizing the cheery and foolish faces with
unconcerned old eyes. Ave! Old knitter of black wool. Morituri te
salutant. Not many of those she looked at ever saw her again— not
half, by a long way.

"There was yet a visit to the doctor. 'A simple formality,'
assured me the secretary, with an air of taking an immense part in
all my sorrows. Accordingly a young chap wearing his hat over the
left eyebrow, some clerk I suppose,— there must have been clerks
in the business, though the house was as still as a house in a city of
the dead,— came from somewhere up-stairs, and led me forth. He
was shabby and careless, with ink-stains on the sleeves of his
jacket, and his cravat was large and billowy, under a chin shaped
like the toe of an old boot. It was a little too early for the doctor,
so I proposed a drink, and thereupon he developed a vein of
joviality. As we sat over our vermouths he glorified the Company's
business, and by-and-by I expressed casually my surprise at him
not going out there. He became very cool and collected all at
once. 'I am not such a fool as I look, quoth Plato to his disciples,'
he said sententiously, emptied his glass with great resolution, and
we rose.

"The old doctor felt my pulse, evidently thinking of something
else the while. 'Good, good for there,' he mumbled, and then with

a certain eagerness asked me whether I would let him measure my
head. Rather surprised, I said Yes, when he produced a thing like
calipers and got die dimensions back and front and every way,
taking notes carefully. He was an unshaven little man in a
threadbare coat like a gaberdine, widi his feet in slippers, and I
thought him a harmless fool. 'I always ask leave, in the interests of
science, to measure die crania of those going out there,' he said.
'And when, they come back too?' I asked. 'Oh, I never see diem,'
he remarked; 'and, moreover, the changes take place inside, you
know.' He smiled, as if at some quiet joke. 'So you are going out
there. Famous. Interesting too.' He gave me a searching glance,
and made another note. 'Ever any madness in your family?' he
asked, in a matter-of-fact tone. I felt very annoyed. 'Is that
question in the interests of science too?' 'It would be,' he said,
without taking notice of my irritation, 'interesting for science to
watch die mental changes of individuals, on the spot, but . . .' 'Are
you an alienist?' I interrupted. 'Every doctor should be— a little,'
answered that original, imperrurbably. 'I have a little dieoiy which
you Messieurs who go out die re must help me to prove. This is
my share in the advantages my country shall reap from the
possession of such a magnificent dependency. The mere wealth I
leave to others. Pardon my questions, but you are die first
Englishman coming under my observation. . . .' I hastened to
assure him I was not in the least typical. 'If I were,' said I, 'I
wouldn't be talking like this with you.' 'What you say is rather
profound, and probably erroneous,' he said, with a laugh. 'Avoid
irritation more than exposure to die sun. Adieu. How do you
English say, eh? Good-by. Ah! Good-by. Adieu. In the tropics one
must before everything keep calm.' . . . He lifted a warning
forefinger. . . . 'Du calme, du calme. Adieu.'

"One tiling more remained to do— say good-by to my excellent
aunt. I found her triumphant. I had a cup of tea— the last decent
cup of tea for many days— and in a room that most soothingly
looked just as you would expect a lady's drawing-room to look, we
had a long quiet chat by the fireside. In the course of these
confidences it became quite plain to me I had been represented to
the wife of the high dignitary, and goodness knows to how many
more people besides, as an exceptional and gifted creature— a
piece of good fortune for the Company— a man you don't get hold
of every day. Good heavens! and I was going to take charge of a
two-penny-halfpenny river-steamboat with a penny whistle
attached! It appeared, however, I was also one of the Workers,
with a capital— you know. Something like an emissary of light,
something like a lower sort of apostle. There had been a lot of
such rot let loose in print and talk just about that time, and the
excellent woman, living right in the rush of all that humbug, got
carried off her feet. She talked about 'weaning those ignorant

millions from their horrid ways,' till, upon my word, she made me
quite uncomfortable. I ventured to hint that the Company was run
for profit.

'"You forget, dear Charlie, that the laborer is worthy of his
hire,' she said, brightly. It's queer how out of touch with truth
women are. They live in a world of their own, and there had never
been anything like it, and never can be. It is too beautiful
altogether, and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before
the first sunset. Some confounded fact we men have been living
contentedly with ever since the day of creation would start up and
knock the whole thing over.

"After this I got embraced, told to wear flannel, be sure to
write often, and so on— and I left. In the street— I don't know why—
a queer feeling came to me that I was an impostor. Odd thing that
I, who used to clear out for any part of the world at twenty-four
hours' notice, with less thought than most men give to the crossing
of a street, had a moment— I won't say of hesitation, but of startled
pause, before this commonplace affair. The best way I can explain
it to you is by saying that, for a second or two, I felt as though,
instead of going to the center of a continent, I were about to set off
for the center of the earth.

"I left in a French steamer, and she called in every blamed
port they have out there, for, as far as I could see, the sole
purpose of landing soldiers and customhouse officers. I watched
the coast. Watching a coast as it slips by the ship is like thinking
about an enigma. There it is before you— smiling, frowning,
inviting, grand, mean, insipid, or savage, and always mute with an
air of whispering, Come and find out. This one was almost
featureless, as if still in the making, with an aspect of monotonous
grimness. The edge of a colossal jungle, so dark-green as to be
almost black, fringed With white surf, ran straight, like a ruled
line, far, far away along a blue sea whose glitter was blurred by a
creeping mist. The sun was fierce, the land seemed to glisten and
drip with steam. Here and there grayish-whitish specks showed up,
clustered inside the white surf, with a flag flying above them
perhaps. Settlements some centuries old, and still no bigger than
pin-heads on the untouched expanse of their background. We
pounded along, stopped, landed soldiers; went on, landed custom-
house clerks to levy toll in what looked like a God-forsaken
wilderness, with a tin shed and a flag-pole lost in it; landed more
soldiers— to take care of the customhouse clerks, presumably.
Some, I heard, got drowned in the surf; but whether they did or
not, nobody seemed particularly to care. They were just flung out
there, and on we went. Every day the coast looked the same, as
though we had not moved; but we passed various places— trading
places— with names like Gran' Bassam Little Popo, names that
seemed to belong to some sordid farce acted in front of a sinister

backcloth. The idleness of a passenger, my isolation amongst all
these men with whom I had no point of contact, the oily and lan-
guid sea, the uniform, somberness of the coast, seemed to keep
me away from tire truth of things, within the toil of a mournful and
senseless delusion. The voice of tire surf heard now and then was
a positive pleasure, like tire speech of a brother. It was something
natural, that had its reason, that had a meaning. Now and then a
boat from tire shore gave one a momentary contact with reality. It
was paddled by black fellows. You could see from afar the white
of their eyeballs glistening. They shouted, sang; their bodies
streamed with perspiration; they had faces like grotesque masks—
these chaps; but they had bone, muscle, a wild vitality, an intense
energy of movement, that was as natural and true as tire surf along
their coast. They wanted no excuse for being there. They were a
great comfort to look at. For a time I would feel I belonged still to
a world of straightforward facts; but the feeling would not last long.
Something would turn up to scare it away. Once, I remember, we
came upon a man-of-war anchored off the coast. There wasn't
even a shed there, and she was shelling the bush. It appeals the
French had one of their wars going on thereabouts. Her ensign
dropped limp like a rag; tire muzzles of the long eight-inch guns
stuck out all over the low hull; the greasy, slimy swell swung her up
lazily and let her down, swaying her thin masts. In tire empty
immensity of earth, sky, and water, there she was,
incomprehensible, firing into a continent. Pop, would go one of
the eight-inch guns; a small flame would dart and vanish, a little
white smoke would disappear, a tiny projectile would give a feeble
screech— and nothing happened. Nothing could happen. There
was a touch of insanity in the proceeding, a sense of lugubrious
drollery in the sight; and it was not dissipated by somebody on
board assuring me earnestly there was a camp of natives— he called
them enemies!— hidden out of sight somewhere.

"We gave her her letters (I heard the men in that lonely ship
were dying of fever at the rate of three a da)') and went on. We
called at some more places with farcical names, where the merry
dance of death and trade goes on in a still and earthy atmosphere
as of an overheated catacomb; all along the formless coast bor-
dered by dangerous surf, as if Nature herself had tried to ward off
intruders; in and out of rivers, streams of death in life, whose
banks were rotting into mud, whose waters, thickened into slime,
invaded the contorted mangroves, that seemed to writhe at us in
the extremity of an impotent despair. Nowhere did we stop long
enough to get a particularized impression, but the general sense of
vague and oppressive wonder grew upon me. It was like a wear) 7
pilgrimage amongst hints for nightmares.

"It was upward of thirty days before I saw the mouth of the big
river. We anchored off the seat of the government. But my work

would not begin till some two hundred miles farther on. So as
soon as I could I made a start for a place thirty miles higher up.

"I had my passage on a little sea-going steamer. Her captain
was a Swede, and knowing me for a seaman, invited me on the
bridge. He was a young man, lean, fair, and morose, with lanky
hair and a shuffling gait. As we left the miserable little wharf, he
tossed his head contemptuously at the shore. 'Been living there?'
he asked. I said, 'Yes.' 'Fine lot these government chaps— are they
not?' he went on, speaking English with, great precision and
considerable bitterness. 'It is funny what some people will do for a
few francs a month. I wonder what becomes of that kind when it
goes up country?' I said to him I expected to see that soon. 'So-o-
o!' he exclaimed. He shuffled athwart, keeping one eye ahead
vigilantly. 'Don't be too sure,' he continued. 'The other day I took
up a man who hanged himself on the road. He was a Swede, too.'
'Hanged himself! Why, in God's name?' I cried. He kept on
looking out watchfully. 'Who knows? The sun too much for him,
or the country perhaps.'

"At last we opened a reach. A rocky cliff appeared, mounds of
turned-up earth by the shore, houses on a hill, others, with iron
roofs, amongst a waste of excavations, or hanging to the declivity.
A continuous noise of the rapids above hovered over this scene of
inhabited devastation. A lot of people, mostly black and naked,
moved about like ants. A jetty projected into the river. A blinding
sunlight drowned all this at times in a sudden recrudescence of
glare. 'There's your Company's station,' said the Swede, pointing
to three wooden barracklike structures on the rocky slope. 'I will
send your things up. Four boxes did you say? So. Farewell.'

"I came upon a boiler wallowing in the grass, then found a
path leading up the hill. It turned aside for the bowlders, and also
for an undersized railway-truck lying there on its back with its
wheels in the air. One was off. The thing looked as dead as the
carcass of some animal. I came upon more pieces of decaying ma-
chinery, a stack of rusty rails. To the left a clump of trees made a
shady spot, where dark tilings seemed to stir feebly. I blinked, the
path was steep. A horn tooted to the right, and I saw the black
people run. A heavy and dull detonation shook the ground, a puff
of smoke came out of the cliff, and that was all. No change ap-
peared on the face of the rock. They were building a railway. The
cliff was not in the way or anything; but this objectless blasting was
all the work going on.

"A slight clinking behind me made me turn my head. Six
black men advanced in a file, toiling up the path. They walked
erect and slow, balancing small baskets full of earth on their heads,
and the clink kept time with their footsteps. Black rags were
wound round their loins, and the short ends behind wagged to and
fro like tails. I could see every rib, the joints of their limbs were

like knots in a rope; each had an iron collar on his neck, and all
were connected together with a chain whose bights swung between
them, rhythmically clinking. Another report from die cliff made
me think suddenly of diat ship of war I had seen firing into a
continent. It was die same kind of ominous voice; but diese men
could by no stretch of imagination be called enemies. They were
called criminals, and die outraged law, like die bursting shells, had
come to diem, an insoluble mystery from over the sea. All their
meager breasts panted togedier, the violently dilated nostrils
quivered, die eyes stared stonily uphill. They passed me within six
inches, without a glance, with that complete, deathlike indifference
of unhappy savages. Behind this raw matter one of the reclaimed,
the product of die new forces at w r ork, strolled despondently,
carrying a rifle by its middle. He had a uniform jacket with one
button off, and seeing a white man on die padi, hoisted his
weapon to his shoulder with alacrity. This was simple prudence,
white men being so much alike at a distance diat he could not tell
who I might be. He was speedily reassured, and widi a large,
white, rascally grin, and a glance at his charge, seemed to take me
into partnership in his exalted trust. After all, I also was a part of
the great cause of these high and just proceedings.

"Instead of going up, I turned and descended to the left. My
idea w r as to let that chain-gang get out of sight before I climbed the
hill. You know I am not particularly tender; I've had to strike and
to fend off. I've had to resist and to attack sometimes— diat's only
one way of resisting— without counting the exact cost, according to
the demands of such sort of life as I had blundered into. I've seen
die devil of violence, and die devil of greed, and the devil of hot
desire; but, by all die stars! these were strong, lusty, red-eyed
devils, diat swayed and drove men— men, I tell you. But as I stood
on this hillside, I foresaw diat in die blinding sunshine of that land
I w r ould become acquainted with a flabby, pretending, w r eak-eyed
devil of a rapacious and pitiless folly. How insidious he could be,
too, I w r as only to find out several months later and a diousand
miles fardier. For a moment I stood appalled, as though by a
warning. Finally I descended the hill, obliquely, towards the trees I
had seen.

"I avoided a vast artificial hole somebody had been digging on
the slope, die purpose of which I found it impossible to divine. It
wasn't a quarry or a sandpit, anyhow. It was just a hole. It might
have been connected with the philanthropic desire of giving the
criminals something to do. I don't know. Then I nearly fell into a
very narrow ravine, almost no more than a scar in the hillside. I
discovered diat a lot of imported drainage -pipes for the settlement
had been tumbled in there. There wasn't one diat was not broken.
It was a wanton smash-up. At last I got under the frees. My
purpose was to stroll into the shade for a moment; but no sooner

within than it seemed to me I had stepped into a gloomy circle of
some Inferno. The rapids were near, and an uninterrupted,
uniform, headlong, rushing noise filled die mournful stillness of
die grove, where not a breath stirred, not a leaf moved, with a
mysterious sound— as though the tearing pace of the launched
earth had suddenly become audible.

"Black shapes crouched, lay, sat between the frees, leaning
against die trunks, clinging to the earth, half coming out, half
effaced within the dim light, in all die attitudes of pain,
abandonment, and despair. Another mine on the cliff went off,
followed by a slight shudder of die soil under my feet. The work
was going on. The work! And diis was die place where some of
the helpers had withdrawn to die.

"They were dying slowly— it was very clear. They were not
enemies, they were not criminals, diey were nothing earthly now,—
nothing but black shadows of disease and starvation, lying
confusedly in the greenish gloom. Brought from all die recesses of
the coast in all the legality of time contracts, lost in uncongenial
surroundings, fed on unfamiliar food, diey sickened, became
inefficient, and were dien allowed to crawl away and rest. These
moribund shapes were free as air— and nearly as thin. I began to
distinguish die gleam of eyes under the trees. Then, glancing
down, I saw a face near my hand. The black bones reclined at full
lengdi with one shoulder against die tree, and slowly the eyelids
rose and die sunken eyes looked up at me, enormous and vacant,
a kind of blind, white flicker in the depths of die orbs, which died
out slowly. The man seemed young— almost a boy— but you know
with diem it's hard to tell. I found nothing else to do but to offer
him one of my good Swede's ship's biscuits I had in my pocket.
The fingers closed slowly on it and held— there was no other
movement and no other glance. He had tied a bit of white worsted
round his neck— Why? Where did he get it? Was it a badge— an
ornament— a charm— a propitiatory act? Was there any idea at all
connected with it? It looked starding round his black neck, this bit
of white diread from beyond the seas.

"Near die same tree two more bundles of acute angles sat with
their legs drawn up. One, with his chin propped on his knees,
stared at nodiing, in an intolerable and appalling manner: his
brodier phantom rested its forehead, as if overcome widi a great
weariness; and all about odiers were scattered in every pose of
contorted collapse, as in some picture of a massacre or a
pestilence. While I stood horror-struck, one of diese creatures
rose to his hands and knees, and went off on all-fours towards the
river to drink. He lapped out of his hand, dien sat up in the
sunlight, crossing his shins in front of him, and after a time let his
woolly head fall on his breastbone.

"I didn't want any more loitering in the shade, and I made

haste towards the station. When near the buildings I met a white
man, in such an unexpected elegance of get-up that in the first
moment I took him for a sort of vision. I saw a high starched
collar, white cuffs, a light alpaca jacket, snowy trousers, a clear
necktie, and varnished boots. No hat. Hair parted, brushed, oiled,
under a green-lined parasol held in a big white hand. He was
amazing, and had a penholder behind his ear.

"I shook hands with this miracle, and I learned he was the
Company's chief accountant, and that all die bookkeeping was
done at this station. He had come out for a moment, he said, 'to
get a breath of fresh air.' The expression sounded wonderfully
odd, with its suggestion of sedentary desk-life. I wouldn't have
mentioned the fellow to you at all, only it was from his lips that I
first heard the name of the man who is so indissolubly connected
with the memories of that time. Moreover, I respected the fellow.
Yes; I respected his collars, his vast cuffs, his brushed hair. His
appearance was certainly that of a hairdresser's dummy; but in the
great demoralization of the land he kept up his appearance. That's
backbone. His starched collars and got-up shirt- fronts were
achievements of character. He had been out nearly three years;
and, later on, I could not help asking him how he managed to
sport such linen. He had just the faintest blush, and said modestly,
'I've been teaching one of the native women about the station. It
was difficult. She had a distaste for the work.' This man had verily
accomplished sometlung. And he was devoted to his books, which
were in apple-pie order.

"Everything else in the station was in a muddle,— heads, tilings,
buildings. Strings of dusty niggers with splay feet arrived and
departed; a stream of manufactured goods, rubbishy cottons,
beads, and brasswire set into the depths of darkness, and in return
came a precious trickle of ivory.

"I had to wait in the station for ten days— an eternity. I lived in
a hut in the yard, but to be out of the chaos I would sometimes get
into the accountant's office. It w r as built of horizontal planks, and
so badly put together that, as he bent over his high desk, he was
barred from neck to heels with narrow strips of sunlight. There
was no need to open the big shutter to see. It was hot there too;
big flies buzzed fiendishly, and did not sting, but stabbed. I sat
generally on the floor, while, of faultless appearance (and even
slightly scented), perching on a high stool, he w r rote, he wrote.
Sometimes he stood up for exercise. When a truckle-bed with a
sick man (some invalided agent from up-country) was put in there,
he exhibited a gentle annoyance. 'The groans of this sick person,'
he said, 'distract my attention. And without that it is extremely
difficult to guard against clerical errors in this climate.'

"One day he remarked, without lifting his head, 'In the
interior you will no doubt meet Mr. Kurtz.' On my asking who

Mr. Kurtz was, he said he was a first-class agent; and seeing my
disappointment at this information, he added slowly, laying down
his pen, 'He is a very remarkable person.' Further questions
elicited from him that Mr. Kurtz was at present in charge of a
trading post, a very important one, in die true ivory-country, at 'the
very bottom of diere. Sends in as much ivory as all die others put
together. . . .' He began to write again. The sick man was too ill to
groan. The flies buzzed in a great peace.

"Suddenly there was a growing murmur of voices and a great
tramping of feet. A caravan had come in. A violent babble of
uncoudi sounds burst out on die odier side of the planks. All the
carriers were speaking together, and in the midst of the uproar the
lamentable voice of die chief agent was heard 'giving it up' tearfully
for die twentieth time that day. . . . He rose slowly. 'What a
frightful row,' he said. He crossed the room gently to look at the
sick man, and returning, said to me, 'He does not hear.' 'What!
Dead?' I asked, starded. 'No, not yet,' he answered, widi great
composure. Then, alluding with a toss of die head to die tumult in
die station-yard, 'When one has got to make correct entries, one
comes to hate diose savages— hate them to the death.' He
remained dioughtful for a moment. ' When you see Mr. Kurtz,' he
went on, 'tell him from me that everything here'— he glanced at the
desk— 'is very satisfactory. I don't like to write to him— with diose
messengers of ours you never know who may get hold of your
letter— at diat Central Station. He stared at me for a moment with
his mild, bulging eyes. 'Oh, he will go far, very far,' he began
again. 'He will be a somebody in the Administration before long.
They, above— die Council in Europe, you know— mean him to be.'

"He turned to his work. The noise outside had ceased, and
presendy in going out I stopped at die door. In die steady buzz of
flies the homeward-bound agent was lying flushed and insensible;
the other, bent over his books, w r as making correct entries of
perfecdy correct transactions; and fifty feet below r the doorstep I
could see the still free-tops of the grove of deadi.

"Next day I left that station at last, with a caravan of sixty men,
for a two-hundred-mile tramp.

"No use telling you much about diat. Padis, paths, everywhere;
a stamped-in network of padis spreading over die empty land,
dirough long grass, dirough burnt grass, dirough thickets, down
and up chilly ravines, up and down stony hills ablaze with heat;
and a solitude, a solitude, nobody, not a hut. The population had
cleared out a long time ago. Well, if a lot of mysterious niggers
armed with all kinds of fearful weapons suddenly took to traveling
on the road between Deal and Gravesend, catching the yokels
right and left to carry heavy loads for them, I fancy every farm and
cottage thereabouts w r ould get empty very soon. Only here the
dwellings were gone too. Still I passed through several abandoned

villages. There's something pathetically childish in the ruins of
grass walls. Day after day, with the stamp and shuffle of sixty pair
of bare feet behind me, each pair under a 60-lb. load. Camp,
cook, sleep, strike camp, march. Now and then a carrier dead in
harness, at rest in die long grass near die path, widi an empty
water-gourd and his long staff lying by his side. A great silence
around and above. Perhaps on some quiet night die tremor of far-
off drums, sinking, swelling, a tremor vast, faint; a sound weird,
appealing, suggestive, and wild— and perhaps with as profound a
meaning as die sound of bells in a Christian country. Once a white
man in an unbuttoned uniform, camping on die padi widi an
armed escort of lank Zanzibaris, very hospitable and festive— not
to say drunk. Was looking after die upkeep of the road, he
declared. Can't say I saw any road or any upkeep, unless die body
of a middle-aged negro, widi a bullet-hole in the forehead, upon
which I absolutely stumbled three miles farther on, may be
considered as a permanent improvement. I had a white
companion too, not a bad chap, but radier too fleshy and with die
exasperating habit of fainting on die hot hillsides, miles away from
the least bit of shade and water. Annoying, you know, to hold your
own coat like a parasol over a man's head while he is coming-to. I
couldn't help asking him once what he meant by coming there at
all. 'To make money, of course. What do you think?' he said,
scornfully. Then he got fever, and had to be carried in a hammock
slung under a pole. As he weighed sixteen stone I had no end of
rows widi die carriers. They jibbed, ran away, sneaked off with
their loads in the night— quite a mutiny. So, one evening, I made a
speech in English with gestures, not one of which was lost to the
sixty pairs of eyes before me, and die next morning I started the
hammock off in front all right. An hour afterwards I came upon
the whole concern wrecked in a bush— man, hammock, groans,
blankets, horrors. The heavy pole had skinned his poor nose. He
was very anxious for me to kill somebody, but there wasn't the
shadow of a carrier near. I remembered the old doctor,— 'It would
be interesting for science to watch the mental changes of
individuals, on die spot.' I felt I was becoming scientifically
interesting. However, all diat is to no purpose. On die fifteenth
day I came in sight of die big river again, and hobbled into die
Central Station. It was on a back water surrounded by scrub and
forest, widi a pretty border of smelly mud on one side, and on the
three others inclosed by a crazy fence of rushes. A neglected gap
was all the gate it had, and die first glance at the place was enough
to let you see die flabby devil was running that show. White men
with long staves in their hands appealed languidly from amongst
the buildings, strolling up to take a look at me, and then retired
out of sight somewhere. One of diem, a stout, excitable chap with
black mustaches, informed me with great volubility and many

digressions, as soon as I told him who I was, diat my steamer was
at die bottom of die river. I was diunderstruck. What, how, why?
Oh, it was 'all right.' The 'manager himself was there. All quite
correct. 'Everybody had behaved splendidly! splendidly!'— 'you
must,' he said in agitation, 'go and see the general manager at
once. He is waiting!'

"I did not see die real significance of that wreck at once. I
fancy I see it now, but I am not sure— not at all. Certainly die affair
was too stupid— when I diink of it— to be altogedier natural. Still. . .
But at the moment it presented itself simply as a confounded nui-
sance. The steamer was sunk. They had started two days before in
a sudden hurry up die river with the manager on board, in charge
of some volunteer skipper, and before they had been out three
hours diey tore die bottom out of her on stones, and she sank
near die soudi bank. I asked myself what I was to do there, now
my boat was lost. As a matter of fact, I had plenty to do in fishing
my command out of the river. I had to set about it die very next
day. That, and the repairs when I brought the pieces to the station,
took some months.

"My first interview with die manager was curious. He did not
ask me to sit down after my twenty-mile walk diat morning. He
was commonplace in complexion, in feature, in manners, and in
voice. He was of middle size and of ordinary build. His eyes, of
the usual blue, were perhaps remarkably cold, and he certainly
could make his glance fall on one as trenchant and heavy as an ax.
But even at these times the rest of his person seemed to disclaim
the intention. Odierwise die re was only an indefinable, faint
expression of his lips, something stealdiy— a smile— not a smile— I
remember it, but I can't explain. It was unconscious, this smile
was, diough just after he had said somediing it got intensified for
an instant. It came at die end of his speeches like a seal applied on
the words to make die meaning of the commonest phrase appear
absolutely inscrutable. He was a common trader, from his youth
up employed in these parts— nothing more. He was obeyed, yet he
inspired neither love nor fear, nor even respect. He inspired
uneasiness. That was it! Uneasiness. Not a definite mistrust— just
uneasiness— nothing more. You have no idea how effective such a .
. . a . . . faculty can be. He had no genius for organizing, for
initiative, or for order even. That was evident in such things as die
deplorable state of die station. He had no learning, and no
intelligence. His position had come to him— why? Perhaps
because he was never ill . . . He had served three terms of three
years out die re. . . . Because triumphant health in the general rout
of constitutions is a kind of power in itself. When he went home
on leave he rioted on a large scale— pompously. Jack ashore— with
a difference— in externals only. This one could gather from his
casual talk. He originated nothing, he could keep die routine

going— that's all. But he was great. He was great by this little thing
that it was impossible to tell what could control such a man. He
never gave that secret away. Perhaps there was nothing within him.
Such a suspicion made one pause— for out there there were no
external checks. Once when various tropical diseases had laid low
almost every 'agent' in the station, he was heard to say, 'Men who
come out here should have no entrails.' He sealed the utterance
with that smile of his, as though it had been a door opening into a
darkness he had in his keeping. You fancied you had seen things—
but the seal was on. When annoyed at meal-times by the constant
quarrels of the white men about precedence, he ordered an im-
mense round table to be made, for which a special house had to
be built. This was the station's mess-room. Where he sat was the
first place— the rest were nowhere. One felt this to be his
unalterable conviction. He was neither civil nor uncivil. He was
quiet. He allowed his 'boy'— an overfed young negro from the
coast— to treat the white men, under his very eyes, with provoking
insolence.

"He began to speak as soon as he saw me. I had been very
long on the road. He could not wait. Had to start without me. The
up-river stations had to be relieved. There had been so many
delays already that he did not know r who was dead and who was
alive, and how they got on— and so on, and so on. He paid no
attention to my explanations, and, playing with a stick of sealing-
wax, repeated several times that the situation was 'very grave, very
grave.' There w r ere rumors that a very important station was in
jeopardy, and its chief, Mr. Kurtz, was ill. Hoped it was not true.
Mr. Kurtz was. . . I felt weary and irritable. Hang Kurtz, I thought.
I interrupted him by saying I had heard of Mr. Kurtz on the coast.
'All! So they talk of him down there,' he murmured to himself.
Then he began again, assuring me Mr. Kurtz was the best agent he
had, an exceptional man, of the greatest importance to the
Company; therefore I could understand his anxiety. He was, he
said, 'very, very uneasy.' Certainly he fidgeted on his chair a good
deal, exclaimed, 'All, Mr. Kurtz!' broke the stick of sealing-wax
and seemed dumbfounded by the accident. Next tiling he wanted
to know 'how long it would take to'. . . I interrupted him again.
Being hungry, you know r , and kept on my feet too, I was getting
savage. 'How could I tell,' I said. 'I hadn't even seen the wreck
yet— some months, no doubt.' All this talk seemed to me so futile.
'Some months,' he said. 'Well, let us say three months before we
can make a start. Yes. That ought to do the affair.' I flung out of
his hut (he lived all alone in a clay hut with a sort of veranda)
muttering to myself my opinion of him. He was a chattering idiot.
Afterwards I took it back when it was borne in upon me startlingly
with what extreme nicety he had estimated the time requisite for
the 'affair.'

"I went to work the next day, turning, so to speak, my back on
that station. In that way only it seemed to me I could keep my
hold on the redeeming facts of life. Still, one must look about
sometimes; and then I saw this station, these men strolling
aimlessly about in the sunshine of the yard. I asked myself
sometimes what it all meant. They wandered here and there with
their absurd long staves in their hands, like a lot of faithless
pilgrims bewitched inside a rotten fence. The word 'ivory' rang in
the air, was whispered, was sighed. You would think they were
praying to it. A taint of imbecile rapacity blew through it all, like a
whiff from some corpse. By Jove! I've never seen anything so
unreal in my life. And outside, the silent wilderness surrounding
this cleared speck on the earth struck me as something great and
invincible, like evil or truth, waiting patiently for the passing away
of this fantastic invasion.

"Oh, these months! Well, never mind. Various things
happened. One evening a grass shed full of calico, cotton prints,
beads, and I don't know what else, burst into a blaze so suddenly
that you would have thought the earth had opened to let an
avenging fire consume all that trash. I was smoking my pipe
quietly by my dismantled steamer, and saw them all cutting capers
in the light, with their arms lifted high, when the stout man with
mustaches came tearing down to the river, a tin pail in his hand,
assured me that everybody was 'behaving splendidly, splendidly,'
dipped about a quart of water and tore back again. I noticed there
was a hole in the bottom of his pail.

"I strolled up. There was no hurry. You see the tiling had
gone off like a box of matches. It had been hopeless from the very
first. The flame had leaped high, driven everybody back, lighted
up everything— and collapsed. The shed was already a heap of
embers glowing fiercely. A nigger was being beaten near by. They
said he had caused the fire in some way; be that as it may, he was
screeching most horribly. I saw him, later on, for several days,
sitting in a bit of shade looking very sick and trying to recover
himself: afterwards he arose and went out— and the wilderness
without a sound took him into its bosom again. As I approached
the glow from the dark I found myself at the back of two men,
talking. I heard the name of Kurtz pronounced, then the words,
'take advantage of this unfortunate accident.' One of the men was
the manager. I wished him a good evening. 'Did you ever see
anything like it— eh? it is incredible,' he said, and walked off. The
other man remained. He w r as a first-class agent, young,
gentlemanly, a bit reserved, with a forked little beard and a
hooked nose. He was stand-offish with the other agents, and they
on their side said he was the manager's spy upon them. As to me,
I had hardly ever spoken to him before. We got into talk, and by-
and-by we strolled away from the hissing ruins. Then he asked me

to his room, which was in die main huilding of the station. He
struck a match, and I perceived diat diis young aristocrat had not
only a silver-mounted dressing-case but also a whole candle all to
himself. Just at that time the manager was die only man supposed
to have any right to candles. Native mats covered the clay walls; a
collection of spears, assegais, shields, knives was hung up in
trophies. The business intrusted to this fellow was die making of
bricks— so I had been informed; but there wasn't a fragment of a
brick anywhere in the station, and he had been there more than a
year— waiting. It seems he could not make bricks without
something, I don't know what— straw maybe. Anyways, it could not
be found there, and as it was not likely to be sent from Europe, it
did not appear clear to me what he was waiting for. An act of
special creation perhaps. However, they were all waiting— all the
sixteen or twenty pilgrims of them— for something; and upon my
word it did not seem an uncongenial occupation, from the way
they took it, though die only thing that ever came to them was
disease— as far as I could see. They beguiled the time by
backbiting and intriguing against each odier in a foolish kind of
way. There was an air of plotting about that station, but nothing
came of it, of course. It was as unreal as everything else— as the
philanthropic pretense of the whole concern, as dieir talk, as their
government, as their show of work. The only real feeling was a
desire to get appointed to a trading-post where ivory was to be
had, so that they could earn percentages. They intrigued and
slandered and hated each odier only on that account,— but as to
effectually lifting a little finger— oh, no. By heavens! there is
something after all in the world allowing one man to steal a horse
while another must not look at a halter. Steal a horse straight out.
Very well. He has done it. Perhaps he can ride. But there is a way
of looking at a halter that would provoke the most charitable of
saints into a kick.

"I had no idea why he wanted to be sociable, but as we chatted
in there it suddenly occurred to me die fellow was trying to get at
something— in fact, pumping me. He alluded constantly to Europe,
to the people I was supposed to know there— putting leading
questions as to my acquaintances in the sepulchral city, and so on.
His little eyes glittered like mica discs— with curiosity,— though he
tried to keep up a bit of superciliousness. At first I was astonished,
but very soon I became awfully curious to see what he would find
out from me. I couldn't possibly imagine what I had in me to
make it worth his while. It was very pretty to see how he baffled
himself, for in truth my body was full of chills, and my head had
nothing in it but that wretched steamboat business. It was evident
he took me for a perfectly shameless prevaricator. At last he got
angry, and, to conceal a movement of furious annoyance, he
yawned. I rose. Then I noticed a small sketch in oils, on a panel,

representing a woman, draped and blindfolded, carrying a lighted
torch. The background was somber— almost black. The movement
of the woman was stately, and the effect of the torchlight on the
face was sinister.

"It arrested me, and he stood by civilly, holding a half-pint
champagne bottle (medical comforts) with the candle stuck in it.
To my question he said Mr. Kurtz had painted this— in this very
station more than a year ago— while waiting for means to go to his
trading-post. 'Tell me, pray,' said I, 'who is this Mr. Kurtz?'

'"The chief of the Inner Station,' he answered in a short tone,
looking away. 'Much obliged,' I said, laughing. 'And you are the
brickmaker of the Central Station. Everyone knows that.' He was
silent for a while. 'He is a prodigy,' he said at last. 'He is an
emissary of pity, and science, and progress, and devil knows what
else. We want,' he began to declaim suddenly, 'for the guidance of
the cause intrusted to us by Europe, so to speak, higher
intelligence, wide sympathies, a singleness of purpose.' 'Who says
that?' I asked. 'Lots of them,' he replied. 'Some even write that;
and so he comes here, a special being, as you ought to know.'
'Why ought I to know?' I interrupted, really surprised. He paid
no attention. 'Yes. To-day he is chief of the best station, next year
he will be assistant-manager, two years more and. . . but I dare say
you know what he will be in two years' time. You are of the new
gang— the gang of virtue. The same people who sent him specially
also recommended you. Oh, don't say no. I've my own eyes to
trust.' Light dawned upon me. My dear aunt's influential
acquaintances were producing an unexpected effect upon that
young man. I nearly burst into a laugh. 'Do you read the
Company's confidential correspondence?' I asked. He hadn't a
word to say. It was great fun. 'When Mr. Kurtz,' I continued
severely, 'is General Manager, you won't have the opportunity.'
"He blew the candle out suddenly, and we went outside.
The moon had risen. Black figures strolled about listlessly,
pouring water on the glow, whence proceeded a sound of hissing;
steam ascended in the moonlight, the beaten nigger groaned
somewhere. 'What a row the brute makes!' said the indefatigable
man with the mustaches, appearing near us. 'Serve him right.
Transgression— punishment— bang! Pitiless, pitiless. That's the only
way. This will prevent all conflagrations for the future. I was just
telling the manager. . . .' He noticed my companion, and became
crestfallen all at once. 'Not in bed yet,' he said, with a kind of
senile heartiness; 'it's so natural. Ha! Danger-agitation.' He
vanished. I went on to the river-side, and the other followed me. I
heard a scathing murmur at my ear, 'Heap of muffs— go to.' The
pilgrims could be seen in knots gesticulating, discussing. Several
had still their staves in their hands. I verily believe they took these
sticks to bed with them. Beyond the fence the forest stood up

spectrally in the moonlight, and through the dim stir, through the
faint sounds of that lamentable courtyard, the silence of the land
went home to one's very heart,— its mystery, its greatness, the
amazing reality of its concealed life. The hurt nigger moaned
feebly somewhere near by, and then fetched a deep sigh that made
me mend my pace away from there. I felt a hand introducing itself
under my arm. 'My dear sir,' said the fellow, 'I don't want to be
misunderstood, and especially by you, who will see Mr. Kurtz long
before I can have that pleasure. I wouldn't like him to get a false
idea of my disposition.

"I let him run on, this papier-mache Mephistopheles, and it
seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger tiirough
him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe.
He, don't you see, had been planning to be assistant-manager by-
and-by under the present man, and I could see that the coining of
that Kurtz had upset them both not a little. He talked precipitately,
and I did not try to stop him. I had my shoulders against the
wreck of my steamer, hauled up on the slope like a carcass of
some big river animal. The smell of mud, of primeval mud, by
Jove! was in my nostrils, the high stillness of primeval forest was
before my eyes; there were shiny patches on the black creek. The
moon had spread over everything a thin layer of silver— over the
rank grass, over the mud, upon the wall of matted vegetation
standing higher than the wall of a temple, over the great river I
could see through a somber gap glittering, glittering, as it flowed
broadly by without a murmur. All this was great, expectant, mute,
while the man jabbered about himself. I wondered whether the
stillness on the face of the immensity looking at us two were meant
as an appeal or as a menace. What were we who had strayed in
here? Could we handle that dumb tiling, or would it handle us? I
felt how big, how confoundedly big, was that thing that couldn't
talk, and perhaps was deaf as well. What was in there? I could see
a little ivory coming out from there, and I had heard Mr. Kurtz
was in there. I had heard enough about it too— God knows! Yet
somehow it didn't bring any image with it— no more than if I had
been told an angel or a fiend was in there. I believed it in the same
way one of you might believe there are inhabitants in the planet
Mars. I knew once a Scotch sailmaker who was certain, dead sure,
there were people in Mars. If you asked him for some idea how
they looked and behaved, he would get shy and mutter something
about 'walking on all-fours.' If you as much as smiled, he would—
though a man of sixty— offer to fight you. I would not have gone so
far as to fight for Kurtz, but I went for him near enough to a lie.
You know I hate, detest, and can't bear a lie, not because I am
straighter than the rest of us, but simply because it appalls me.
There is a taint of death, a flavor of mortality in lies,— which is
exactly what I hate and detest in the world— what I want to forget.

It makes me miserable and sick, like biting something rotten
would do. Temperament, I suppose. Well, I went near enough to
it by letting the young fool there believe anything he liked to
imagine as to my influence in Europe. I became in an instant as
much of a pretense as the rest of the bewitched pilgrims. This
simply because I had a notion it somehow would be of help to that
Kurtz whom at the time I did not see— you understand. He was
just a word for me. I did not see the man in the name any more
than you do. Do you see him? Do you see the story? Do you see
anything? It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream— making a
vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the
dream-sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and
bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being
captured by the incredible which is of the very essence of dreams.

He was silent for a while.

". . . No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-
sensation of any given epoch of one's existence,— that which makes
its truth, its meaning— its subtle and penetrating essence. It is
impossible. We live, as we dream— alone. . . ."

He paused again as if reflecting, then added—

"Of course in this you fellows see more than I could then. You
see me, whom you know. . . ."

It had become so pitch dark that we listeners could hardly see
one another. For a long time already he, sitting apart, had been no
more to us than a voice. There was not a word from anybody. The
others might have been asleep, but I was awake. I listened, I
listened on the watch for the sentence, for the word, that would
give me the clew to the faint uneasiness inspired by this narrative
that seemed to shape itself without human lips in the heavy night-
air of the river.

". . . Yes— I let him run on," Marlow began again, "and think
what he pleased about the powers that were behind me. I did!
And there was nothing behind me! There was nothing but that
wretched, old, mangled steamboat I was leaning against, while he
talked fluently about 'the necessity for every man to get on.' 'And
when one comes out here, you conceive, it is not to gaze at the
moon.' Mr. Kurtz w r as a 'universal genius,' but even a genius
w r ould find it easier to work with 'adequate tools— intelligent men.'
He did not make bricks— why, there w r as a physical impossibility in
the way— as I was well aware; and if he did secretarial work for the
manager, it was because 'no sensible man rejects w r antonly the
confidence of his superiors.' Did I see it? I saw it. What more did
I want? What I really w r anted was rivets, by heaven! Rivets. To get
on with the work— to stop the hole. Rivets I wanted. There w r ere
cases of them down at the coast— cases— piled up— burst— split! You
kicked a loose rivet at every second step in that station yard on the

hillside. Rivets had rolled into the grove of death. You could fill
your pockets with rivets for the trouble of stooping down— and
there wasn't one rivet to be found where it was wanted. We had
plates that would do, but nothing to fasten them with. And every
week the messenger, a lone negro, letter-bag on shoulder and staff
in hand, left our station for the coast. And several times a week a
coast caravan came in with trade goods,— ghastly glazed calico that
made you shudder only to look at it, glass beads value about a
penny a quail, confounded spotted cotton handkerchiefs. And no
rivets. Three carriers could have brought all that was wanted to set
that steamboat afloat.

"He was becoming confidential now, but I fancy my
unresponsive attitude must have exasperated him at last, for he
judged it necessary to inform me he feared neither God nor devil,
let alone any mere man. I said I could see tiiat very well, but what
I wanted was a certain quantity of rivets— and rivets were what
really Mr. Kurtz wanted, if he had only known it. Now letters went
to the coast every week. . . . 'My dear sir,' he cried, 'I write from
dictation.' I demanded rivets. There was a way— for an intelligent
man. He changed his manner; became very cold, and suddenly
began to talk about a hippopotamus; wondered whether sleeping
on board the steamer (I stuck to my salvage night and day) I wasn't
disturbed. There was an old hippo tiiat had the bad habit of
getting out on the bank and roaming at night over the station
grounds. The pilgrims used to turn out in a body and empty every
rifle they could lay hands on at him. Some even had sat up o'
nights for him. All this energy was wasted, though. 'That animal
has a charmed life,' he said; 'but you can say this only of brutes in
this country. No man— you apprehend me?— no man here bears a
charmed life.' He stood there for a moment in the moonlight with
his delicate hooked nose set a little askew, and his mica eyes
glittering without a wink, then, with a curt Good night, he strode
off. I could see he was disturbed and considerably puzzled, which
made me feel more hopeful than I had been for days. It was a
great comfort to turn from that chap to my influential friend, the
battered, twisted, ruined, tin-pot steamboat. I clambered on
board. She rang under my feet like an empty Huntley & Palmer
biscuit-tin kicked along a gutter; she was nothing so solid in make,
and rather less pretty in shape, but I had expended enough hard
work on her to make me love her. No influential friend would
have served me better. She had given me a chance to come out a
bit— to find out what I could do. No, I don't like work. I had rather
laze about and think of all the fine things tiiat can be done. I don't
like work— no man does— but I like what is in the work,— the
chance to find yourself. Your own reality— for yourself, not for
others— what no other man can ever know. They can only see the
mere show, and never can tell what it really means.

"I was not surprised to see somebody sitting aft, on the deck,
with his legs dangling over die mud. You see I radier chummed
with the few mechanics diere were in that station, whom die other
pilgrims naturally despised— on account of dieir imperfect
manners, I suppose. This was die foreman— a boiler-maker by
trade— a good worker. He was a lank, bony, yellow-faced man, with
big intense eyes. His aspect was worried, and his head was as bald
as die palm of my hand; but his hair in falling seemed to have
stuck to his chin, and had prospered in the new locality, for his
beard hung down to his waist. He was a widower with six young
children (he had left them in charge of a sister of his to come out
there), and the passion of his life was pigeon-flying. He was an
endiusiast and a connoisseur. He would rave about pigeons. After
work hours he used sometimes to come over from his hut for a
talk about his children and his pigeons; at work, when he had to
crawl in die mud under die bottom of the steamboat, he would tie
up that beard of his in a kind of white serviette he brought for die
purpose. It had loops to go over his ears. In die evening he could
be seen squatted on die bank rinsing that wrapper in the creek
with great care, then spreading it solemnly on a bush to dry.

"I slapped him on the back and shouted 'We shall have
rivets!' He scrambled to his feet exclaiming 'No! Rivets!' as diough
he couldn't believe his ears. Then in a low voice, 'You . . . eh?' I
don't know why we behaved like lunatics. I put my finger to the
side of my nose and nodded mysteriously. 'Good for you!' he
cried, snapped his fingers above his head, lifting one foot. I tried a
jig. We capered on the iron deck. A frightful clatter came out of
that hulk, and the virgin forest on die other bank of die creek sent
it back in a thundering roll upon die sleeping station. It must have
made some of die pilgrims sit up in dieir hovels. A dark figure
obscured die lighted doorway of die manager's hut, vanished,
then, a second or so after, the doorway itself vanished too. We
stopped, and die silence driven away by the stamping of our feet
flowed back again from the recesses of die land. The great wall of
vegetation, an exuberant and entangled mass of trunks, branches,
leaves, boughs, festoons, motionless in die moonlight, was like a
rioting invasion of soundless life, a rolling wave of plants, piled up,
crested, ready to topple over die creek, to sweep every little man
of us out of his little existence. And it moved not. A deadened
burst of mighty splashes and snorts reached us from afar, as
though an ichthyosaurus had been taking a bath of glitter in the
great river. 'After all,' said the boiler-maker in a reasonable tone,
'why shouldn't we get the rivets?' Why not, indeed! I did not
know of any reason why we shouldn't. 'They'll come in three
weeks,' I said, confidently.

"But they didn't. Instead of rivets there came an invasion, an
infliction, a visitation. It came in sections during the next three

weeks, each section headed by a donkey carrying a white man in
new clothes and tan shoes, bowing from that elevation right and
left to die impressed pilgrims. A quarrelsome band of footsore
sulky niggers trod on the heels of die donkeys; a lot of tents, camp-
stools, tin boxes, white cases, brown bales would be shot down in
the courtyard, and the air of mystery would deepen a little over the
muddle of the station. Five such installments came, widi their
absurd air of disorderly flight with the loot of innumerable outfit
shops and provision stores, that, one would diink, they were
lugging, after a raid, into the wilderness for equitable division. It
was an inextricable mess of things decent in themselves but diat
human folly made look like die spoils of thieving.

"This devoted band called itself the Eldorado Exploring
Expedition, and I believe they were sworn to secrecy. Their talk,
however, was die talk of sordid buccaneers: it was reckless widiout
hardihood, greedy without audacity, and cruel without courage;
there was not an atom of foresight or of serious intention in the
whole batch of them, and diey did not seem aware diese tilings are
wanted for die work of the world. To tear treasure out of the
bowels of the land was their desire, with no more moral purpose
at the back of it than there is in burglars breaking into a safe. Who
paid the expenses of the noble enterprise I don't know; but the
uncle of our manager was leader of that lot.

"In exterior he resembled a butcher in a poor neighborhood,
and his eyes had a look of sleepy cunning. He carried his fat
paunch with ostentation on his short legs, and during die time his
gang infested the station spoke to no one but his nephew. You
could see diese two roaming about all day long with their heads
close togedier in an everlasting confab.

"I had given up worrying myself about die rivets. One's
capacity for that kind of folly is more limited dian you would
suppose. I said Hang!— and let things slide. I had plenty of time for
meditation, and now and dien I would give some thought to Kurtz.
I wasn't very interested in him. No. Still, I was curious to see
whether this man, who had come out equipped with moral ideas
of some sort, would climb to the top after all, and how he would
set about his work when there."

II

"One evening as I was lying flat on the deck of my steamboat,
I heard voices approaching— and there were the nephew and the
uncle strolling along die bank. I laid my head on luy arm again,
and had nearly lost myself in a doze, when somebody said in my
ear, as it were: 'I am as harmless as a little child, but I don't like to
be dictated to. Am I the manager— or am I not? I was ordered to

send him there. It's incredible.' ... I became aware diat the two
were standing on die shore alongside the forepart of the
steamboat, just below my head. I did not move; it did not occur to
me to move: I was sleepy. 'It is unpleasant,' grunted the uncle. 'He
has asked die Administration to be sent there,' said the other,
'with the idea of showing what he could do; and I was instructed
accordingly. Look at die influence that man must have. Is it not
frightful?' They both agreed it was frightful, then made several
bizarre remarks: 'Make rain and fine weather— one man— die
Council— by die nose'— bits of absurd sentences diat got the better
of my drowsiness, so diat I had pretty near the whole of my wits
about me when the uncle said, 'The climate may do away with this
difficulty for you. Is he alone there?' 'Yes,' answered the manager;
'he sent his assistant down die river widi a note to me in these
terms: "Clear this poor devil out of the country, and don't bodier
sending more of that sort. I had radier be alone than have die
kind of men you can dispose of with me." It was more than a year
ago. Can you imagine such impudence!' 'Anything since then?'
asked the other, hoarsely. 'Ivory,' jerked die nephew; 'lots of it-
prime sort— lots— most annoying, from him.' 'And with that?'
questioned die heavy rumble. 'Invoice,' was die reply fired out, so
to speak. Then silence. They had been talking about Kurtz.

"I was broad awake by this time, but, lying perfectly at ease,
remained still, having no inducement to change my position. 'How
did that ivory come all this way?' growled the elder man, who
seemed very vexed. The other explained that it had come with a
fleet of canoes in charge of an English half-caste clerk Kurtz had
with him; diat Kurtz had apparendy intended to return himself,
die station being by that time bare of goods and stores, but after
coming three hundred miles, had suddenly decided to go back,
which he started to do alone in a small dug-out with four paddlers,
leaving the half-caste to continue down die river with the ivory.
The two fellows there seemed astounded at anybody attempting
such a tiling. They were at a loss for an adequate motive. As to
me, I seemed to see Kurtz for die first time. It was a distinct
glimpse: the dug-out, four paddling savages, and the lone white
man turning his back suddenly on the headquarters, on relief, on
thoughts of home— perhaps; setting his face tenvards die depths of
the wilderness, towards his empty and desolate station. I did not
know r the motive. Perhaps he w r as just simply a fine fellow r who
stuck to his work for its own sake. His name, you understand, had
not been pronounced once. He was 'diat man.' The half-caste,
who, as far as I could see, had conducted a difficult trip with great
prudence and pluck, was invariably alluded to as 'that scoundrel.'
The 'scoundrel' had reported that the 'man' had been very ill— had
recovered imperfectly. . . . The two below me moved away dien a
few r paces, and strolled back and fordi at some little distance. I

heard: 'Military post — doctor— two hundred miles— quite alone
now— unavoidable delays— nine months— no news— strange rumors.'
They approached again, just as die manager was saying, 'No one,
as far as I know, unless a species of wandering trader— a
pestilential fellow, snapping ivory from die natives.' Who was it
they were talking about now? I gathered in snatches that this was
some man supposed to be in Kurtz's district, and of whom the
manager did not approve. 'We will not be free from unfair
competition till one of these fellows is hanged for an example,' he
said. 'Certainly,' grunted die odier; 'get him hanged! Why not?
Anything— anything can be done in this country. That's what I say;
nobody here, you understand, here, can endanger your position.
And why? You stand the climate— you oudast diem all. The
danger is in Europe; but diere before I left I took care to—' They
moved off and whispered, then their voices rose again. 'The
extraordinary series of delays is not my fault. I did my possible.'
The fat man sighed, 'Very sad.' 'And the pestiferous absurdity of
his talk,' continued the other; 'he bothered me enough when he
was here. "Each station should be like a beacon on the road
towards better tilings, a center for trade of course, but also for
humanizing, improving, instructing." Conceive you— that ass! And
he wants to be manager! No, it's—' Here he got choked by
excessive indignation, and I lifted my head the least bit. I was
surprised to see how near they were— right under me. I could have
spat upon their hats. They were looking on the ground, absorbed
in thought. The manager was switching his leg with a slender twig:
his sagacious relative lifted his head. 'You have been well since
you came out this time?' he asked. The other gave a start. 'Who?
I? Oh! Like a charm— like a charm. But the rest— oh, my
goodness! All sick. They die so quick, too, that I haven't the time
to send diem out of the country— it's incredible!' 'H'm. Just so,'
grunted die uncle. 'Ah! my boy, trust to this— I say, trust to this.' I
saw him extend his short flipper of an arm for a gesture that took
in the forest, the creek, the mud, the river,— seemed to beckon
with a dishonoring flourish before the sunlit face of the land a
treacherous appeal to die lurking death, to the hidden evil, to die
profound darkness of its heart. It was so startling that I leaped to
my feet and looked back at the edge of die forest, as though I had
expected an answer of some sort to that black display of
confidence. You know the foolish notions that come to one some-
times. The high stillness confronted these two figures with its
ominous patience, waiting for the passing away of a fantastic
invasion.

"They swore aloud together— out of sheer fright, I believe-
then pretending not to know anything of my existence, turned
back to die station. The sun was low; and leaning forward side by
side, they seemed to be tugging painfully uphill their two

ridiculous shadows of unequal length, diat trailed behind diem
slowly over die tall grass widiout bending a single blade.

"In a few days die Eldorado Expedition went into the patient
wilderness, diat closed upon it as the sea closes over a diver. Long
afterwards die news came diat all the donkeys were dead. I know
nothing as to die fate of the less valuable animals. They, no doubt,
like the rest of us, found what diey deserved. I did not inquire. I
was then radier excited at the prospect of meeting Kurtz very
soon. When I say very soon I mean it comparatively. It was just
two mondis from the day we left the creek when we came to the
bank below Kurtz's station.

"Going up that river was like traveling back to the earliest
beginnings of the world, when vegetation rioted on die eardi and
the big trees were kings. An empty stream, a great silence, an
impenetrable forest. The air was warm, thick, heavy, sluggish.
There was no joy in the brilliance of sunshine. The long stretches
of the waterway ran on, deserted, into the gloom of overshadowed
distances. On silvery sandbanks hippos and alligators sunned
themselves side by side. The broadening waters flowed through a
mob of wooded islands; you lost your way on that river as you
would in a desert, and butted all day long against shoals, trying to
find the channel, till you thought yourself bewitched and cut off
for ever from everything you had known once— somewhere— far
away— in anodier existence perhaps. There were moments when
one's past came back to one, as it will sometimes when you have
not a moment to spare to yourself; but it came in the shape of an
unrestful and noisy dream, remembered widi wonder amongst the
overwhelming realities of this strange world of plants, and water,
and silence. And this stillness of life did not in die least resemble a
peace. It was die stillness of an implacable force brooding over an
inscrutable intention. It looked at you widi a vengeful aspect. I got
used to it afterwards; I did not see it any more; I had no time. I
had to keep guessing at die channel; I had to discern, mostly by
inspiration, the signs of hidden banks; I watched for sunken
stones; I was learning to clap my teedi smartly before my heart
flew out, when I shaved by a fluke some infernal sly old snag that
would have ripped die life out of the tin-pot steamboat and
drowned all the pilgrims; I had to keep a look-out for die signs of
dead wood we could cut up in die night for next day's steaming.
When you have to attend to things of that sort, to the mere
incidents of the surface, die reality— the reality, I tell you— fades.
The inner trudi is hidden— luckily, luckily. But I felt it all the same;
I felt often its mysterious stillness watching me at my monkey
tricks, just as it watches you fellows performing on your respective
tight-ropes for— what is it? half-a-crown a tumble—"

"Try to be civil, Marlow," growled a voice, and I knew diere
was at least one listener awake besides myself.

"I beg your pardon. I forgot the heartache which makes up the
rest of die price. And indeed what does the price matter, if the
trick be well done? You do your tricks very well. And I didn't do
badly either, since I managed not to sink that steamboat on my
first trip. It's a wonder to me yet. Imagine a blindfolded man set to
drive a van over a bad road. I sweated and shivered over that
business considerably, I can tell you. After all, for a seaman, to
scrape die bottom of the thing diat's supposed to float all die time
under his care is die unpardonable sin. No one may know of it,
but you never forget die thump— eh? A blow on the very heart.
You remember it, you dream of it, you wake up at night and think
of it— years after— and go hot and cold all over. I don't pretend to
say diat steamboat floated all die time. More than once she had to
wade for a bit, with twenty cannibals splashing around and
pushing.

We had enlisted some of these chaps on the way for a crew.
Fine fellows— cannibals— in their place. They were men one could
work with, and I am grateful to them. And, after all, they did not
eat each odier before my face: diey had brought along a provision
of hippo-meat which went rotten, and made the mystery of the
wilderness stink in my nostrils. Phoo! I can sniff it now. I had the
manager on board and three or four pilgrims with their staves— all
complete. Sometimes we came upon a station close by the bank,
clinging to the skirts of die unknown, and the white men rushing
out of a tumble-down hovel, with great gestures of joy and surprise
and welcome, seemed very strange,— had die appearance of being
held there captive by a spell. The word ivory would ring in die air
for a while— and on we went again into die silence, along empty
reaches, round die still bends, between the high walls of our
winding way, reverberating in hollow r claps the ponderous beat of
die stern-wiieel. Trees, trees, millions of trees, massive, immense,
running up high; and at their foot, hugging the bank against the
stream, crept the little begrimed steamboat, like a sluggish beetle
crawling on the floor of a lofty portico. It made you feel very
small, very lost, and yet it was not altogether depressing that feel-
ing. After all, if you w r ere small, die grimy beetle crawied on—
which was just what you wanted it to do. Where die pilgrims
imagined it crawied to I don't know r . To some place where they
expected to get something, I bet! For me it crawled toward Kurtz—
exclusively; but when the steam-pipes started leaking we crawied
very slow. The reaches opened before us and closed behind, as if
the forest had stepped leisurely across die water to bar die way for
our return. We penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of
darkness. It was very quiet there. At night sometimes the roll of
drums behind the curtain of trees would run up the river and
remain sustained faintly, as if hovering in the air high over our
heads, till the first break of day. Whether it meant war, peace, or

prayer we could not tell. The dawns were heralded by the descent
of a chill stillness; the woodcutters slept, their fires burned low; the
snapping of a twig would make you start. We were wanderers on a
prehistoric earth, on an earth that wore the aspect of an unknown
planet. We could have fancied ourselves the first of men taking
possession of an accursed inheritance, to be subdued at the cost of
profound anguish and of excessive toil. But suddenly, as we
struggled round a bend, there would be a glimpse of rush walls, of
peaked grass-roofs, a burst of yells, a whirl of black limbs, a mass
of hands clapping, of feet stamping, of bodies swaying, of eyes
rolling, under the droop of heavy and motionless foliage. The
steamer toiled along slowly on the edge of a black and
incomprehensible frenzy. The prehistoric man was cursing us,
praying to us, welcoming us— who could tell? We were cut off
from the comprehension of our surroundings; we glided past like
phantoms, wondering and secretly appalled, as sane men would be
before an enthusiastic outbreak in a madhouse. We could not
understand, because we were too far and could not remember,
because we were traveling in the night of first ages, of those ages
that are gone, leaving hardly a sign— and no memories.

"The earth seemed unearthly. We are accustomed to look
upon the shackled form of a conquered monster, but there— there
you could look at a tiling monstrous and free. It was unearthly,
and the men were— No, they were not inhuman. Well, you know,
that was the worst of it— this suspicion of their not being inhuman.
It would come slowly to one. They howled, and leaped, and spun,
and made horrid faces; but what thrilled you was just the thought
of their humanity— like yours— the thought of your remote kinship
with this wild and passionate uproar. Ugly. Yes, it was ugly
enough; but if you were man enough you would admit to yourself
that there was in you just the faintest trace of a response to the
terrible frankness of that noise, a dim suspicion of there being a
meaning in it which you— you so remote from the night of first
ages— could comprehend. And why not? The mind of man is
capable of anything— because everything is in it, all the past as well
as all the future. What was there after all? Joy, fear, sorrow,
devotion, valor, rage— who can tell?— but truth— truth stripped of its
cloak of time. Let the fool gape and shudder— the man knows, and
can look on without a wink. But he must at least be as much of a
man as these on the shore. He must meet that truth with his own
true stuff— with his own inborn strength. Principles? Principles
won't do. Acquisitions, clothes, pretty rags— rags that would fly off
at the first good shake. No; you want a deliberate belief. An appeal
to me in this fiendish row r — is there? Very well; I hear; I admit, but
I have a voice too, and for good or evil mine is the speech that
cannot be silenced. Of course, a fool, what with sheer fright and
fine sentiments, is always safe. Who's that grunting? You wonder I

didn't go ashore for a howl and a dance? Well, no— I didn't. Fine
sentiments, you say? Fine sentiments, be hanged! I had no time. I
had to mess about with white -lead and strips of woolen blanket
helping to put bandages on those leaky steam-pipes— I tell you. I
had to watch the steering, and circumvent those snags, and get the
tin-pot along by hook or by crook. There was surface-truth enough
in these things to save a wiser man. And between whiles I had to
look after the savage who was fireman. He was an improved
specimen; he could fire up a vertical boiler. He was there below
me, and, upon my word, to look at him was as edifying as seeing a
dog in a parody of breeches and a feather hat, walking on his hind-
legs. A few months of training had done for that really fine chap.
He squinted at the steam-gauge and at the water-gauge with an
evident effort of intrepidity— and he had filed teeth too, the poor
devil, and the wool of his pate shaved into queer patterns, and
three ornamental scars on each of his cheeks. He ought to have
been clapping his hands and stamping his feet on the bank,
instead of which he was hard at work, a thrall to strange witchcraft,
full of improving knowledge. He was useful because he had been
instructed; and what he knew was this— that should the water in
that transparent thing disappear, the evil spirit inside the boiler
would get angry through the greatness of his thirst, and take a
terrible vengeance. So he sweated and fired up and watched the
glass fearfully (with an impromptu charm, made of rags, tied to his
arm, and a piece of polished bone, as big as a watch, stuck flatways
through his lower lip), while the wooded banks slipped past us
slowly, the short noise was left behind, the interminable miles of
silence— and we crept on, towards Kurtz. But the snags were thick,
the water was treacherous and shallow, the boiler seemed indeed
to have a sulky devil in it, and thus neither that fireman nor I had
any time to peer into our creepy thoughts.

"Some fifty miles below the Inner Station we came upon a hut
of reeds, an inclined and melancholy pole, with the
unrecognizable tatters of what had been a flag of some sort flying
from it, and a neatly stacked woodpile. This was unexpected. We
came to the bank, and on the stack of firewood found a flat piece
of board with some faded pencil-writing on it. When deciphered it
said: 'Wood for you. Hurry up. Approach cautiously.' There was
a signature, but it was illegible — not Kurtz— a much longer word.
Hurry up. Where? Up the river? 'Approach cautiously.' We had
not done so. But the warning could not have been meant for the
place where it could be only found after approach. Something was
wrong above. But what— and how much? That was the question.
We commented adversely upon the imbecility of that telegraphic
style. The bush around said nothing, and would not let us look
very far, either. A torn curtain of red twill hung in the doorway of
the hut, and flapped sadly in our faces. The dwelling was

dismantled; but we could see a white man had lived there not very
long ago. There remained a rude table— a plank on two posts; a
heap of rubbish reposed in a dark corner, and by die door I
picked up a book. It had lost its covers, and the pages had been
thumbed into a state of extremely dirty softness; but the back had
been lovingly stitched afresh with white cotton thread, which
looked clean yet. It was an extraordinary find. Its title was, 'An
Inquiry into some Points of Seamanship,' by a man Tower,
Towson— some such name— Master in his Majesty's Navy. The
matter looked dreary reading enough, with illustrative diagrams
and repulsive tables of figures, and the copy was sixty years old. I
handled this amazing antiquity with the greatest possible
tenderness, lest it should dissolve in my hands. Widiin, Towson
or Towser was inquiring earnestly into the breaking strain of ships'
chains and tackle, and odier such matters. Not a very enthralling
book; but at the first glance you could see there a singleness of
intention, an honest concern for die right way of going to work,
which made these humble pages, thought out so many years ago,
luminous with anodier dian a professional light. The simple old
sailor, with his talk of chains and purchases, made me forget the
jungle and the pilgrims in a delicious sensation of having come
upon somediing unmistakably real. Such a book being there was
wonderful enough; but still more astounding were the notes
penciled in die margin, and plainly referring to die text. I couldn't
believe my eyes! They were in cipher! Yes, it looked like cipher.
Fancy a man lugging with him a book of that description into this
nowiiere and studying it— and making notes— in cipher at that! It
was an extravagant mystery.

"I had been dimly aware for some time of a worrying noise,
and when I lifted my eyes I saw the w r ood-pile was gone, and die
manager, aided by all the pilgrims, was shouting at me from the
river-side. I slipped the book into my pocket. I assure you to leave
off reading was like tearing myself away from the shelter of an old
and solid friendship.

"I started the lame engine ahead. 'It must be this miserable
trader— this intruder,' exclaimed the manager, looking back
malevolently at die place we had left. 'He must be English,' I said.
'It will not save him from getting into trouble if he is not careful,'
muttered the manager darkly. I observed with assumed innocence
that no man was safe from trouble in this world.

"The current was more rapid now, the steamer seemed at her
last gasp, die stern-wiieel flopped languidly, and I caught myself
listening on tiptoe for the next beat of the float, for in sober trudi I
expected die wretched thing to give up every moment. It was like
watching the last flickers of a life. But still we crawled. Sometimes
I w r ould pick out a tree a little way ahead to measure our progress
towards Kurtz by, but I lost it invariably before we got abreast. To

keep the eyes so long on one thing was too much for human
patience. The manager displayed a beautiful resignation. I fretted
and fumed and took to arguing with myself whether or no I would
talk openly with Kurtz; but before I could come to any conclusion
it occurred to me that my speech or my silence, indeed any action
of mine, would be a mere futility. What did it matter what anyone
knew or ignored? What did it matter who was manager? One gets
sometimes such a flash of insight. The essentials of this affair lay
deep under the surface, beyond my reach, and, beyond my power
of meddling.

"Towards the evening of the second day we judged ourselves
about eight miles from Kurtz's station. I wanted to push on; but
the manager looked grave, and told me the navigation up there
was so dangerous that it would be advisable, the sun being very
low already, to wait where we were till next morning. Moreover, he
pointed out that if the warning to approach cautiously were to be
followed, we must approach in daylight— not at dusk, or in the
dark. This was sensible enough. Eight miles meant nearly three
hours' steaming for us, and I could also see suspicious ripples at
the upper end of the reach. Nevertheless, I was annoyed beyond
expression at the delay, and most unreasonably too, since one
night more could not matter much after so many months. As we
had plenty of wood, and caution was the word, I brought up in the
middle of the stream. The reach was narrow, straight, with high
sides like a railway cutting. The dusk came gliding into it long
before the sun had set. The current ran smooth and swift, but a
dumb immobility sat on the banks. The living trees, lashed
together by the creepers and every living bush of the undergrowth,
might have been changed into stone, even to the slenderest twig, to
the lightest leaf. It was not sleep— it seemed unnatural, like a state
of trance. Not the faintest sound of any kind could be heard. You
looked on amazed, and began to suspect yourself of being deaf-
then the night came suddenly, and struck you blind as well. About
three in the morning some large fish leaped, and the loud splash
made me jump as though a gun had been fired. When the sun
rose there was a white fog, very warm and clammy, and more
blinding than the night. It did not shift or drive; it was just there,
standing all round you like something solid. At eight or nine,
perhaps, it lifted as a shutter lifts. We had a glimpse of the tower-
ing multitude of trees, of the immense matted jungle, with the
blazing little ball of the sun hanging over it— all perfectly still— and
then the white shutter came down again, smoothly, as if sliding in
greased grooves. I ordered the chain, which we had begun to
heave in, to be paid out again. Before it stopped running with a
muffled rattle, a cry, a very loud cry, as of infinite desolation,
soared slowly in the opaque air. It ceased. A complaining clamor,
modulated in savage discords, filled our ears. The sheer

unexpectedness of it made my hair stir under my cap. I don't
know how it struck the others: to me it seemed as though the mist
itself had screamed, so suddenly, and apparendy from all sides at
once, did diis tumultuous and mournful uproar arise. It
culminated in a hurried outbreak of almost intolerably excessive
shrieking, which stopped short, leaving us stiffened in a variety of
silly attitudes, and obstinately listening to die nearly as appalling
and excessive silence. 'Good God! What is the meaning—?'
stammered at my elbow one of die pilgrims,— a little fat man, with
sandy hair and red whiskers, who wore side-spring boots, and pink
pyjamas tucked into his socks. Two others remained open-
mouthed a whole minute, then dashed into the little cabin, to rush
out incontinently and stand darting scared glances, with Win-
chesters at 'ready' in their hands. What we could see was just the
steamer we were on, her oudines blurred as though she had been
on the point of dissolving, and a misty strip of water, perhaps two
feet broad, around her— and diat was all. The rest of the world was
nowhere, as far as our eyes and ears were concerned. Just
nowhere. Gone, disappeared; swept off without leaving a whisper
or a shadow behind.

"I went forward, and ordered the chain to be hauled in short,
so as to be ready to trip die anchor and move the steamboat at
once if necessary. 'Will diey attack?' whispered an awed voice.
'We will be all butchered in this fog,' murmured another. The
faces twitched with die strain, die hands trembled slightly, the eyes
forgot to wink. It was very curious to see die contrast of ex-
pressions of the white men and of the black fellows of our crew,
who w r ere as much strangers to that part of die river as we, though
their homes were only eight hundred miles away. The whites, of
course greatly discomposed, had besides a curious look of being
painfully shocked by such an outrageous row. The odiers had an
alert, naturally interested expression; but their faces were es-
sentially quiet, even those of die one or two who grinned as they
hauled at die chain. Several exchanged short, grunting phrases,
which seemed to setde the matter to their satisfaction. Their
headman, a young, broad-chested black, severely draped in dark-
blue fringed clodis, with fierce nostrils and his hair all done up art-
fully in oily ringlets, stood near me. 'Aha!' I said, just for good
fellowship's sake. 'Catch 'im,' he snapped, with a bloodshot
widening of his eyes and a flash of sharp teedi— 'catch 'im. Give
'im to us.' 'To you, eh?' I asked; 'what would you do with them?'
'Eat 'im!' he said curdy, and, leaning his elbow r on the rail, looked
out into die fog in a dignified and profoundly pensive attitude. I
would no doubt have been properly horrified, had it not occurred
to me that he and his chaps must be very hungry: that they must
have been growing increasingly hungry for at least this month past.
They had been engaged for six months (I don't think a single one

of them had any clear idea of time, as we at die end of countless
ages have. They still belonged to the beginnings of time— had no
inherited experience to teach them as it were), and of course, as
long as diere was a piece of paper written over in accordance with
some farcical law or odier made down die river, it didn't enter
anybody's head to trouble how diey would live. Certainly they had
brought with diem some rotten hippo-meat, which couldn't have
lasted very long, anyway, even if the pilgrims hadn't, in the midst
of a shocking hullabaloo, thrown a considerable quantity of it
overboard. It looked like a high-handed proceeding; but it was
really a case of legitimate self-defense. You can't breadie dead
hippo waking, sleeping, and eating, and at the same time keep
your precarious grip on existence. Besides that, they had given
them every week diree pieces of brass wire, each about nine
inches long; and die theory was they were to buy dieir provisions
with that currency in river-side villages. You can see how that
worked. There were either no villages, or die people were hostile,
or the director, who like the rest of us fed out of tins, widi an
occasional old he-goat dirown in, didn't want to stop the steamer
for some more or less recondite reason. So, unless diey swallowed
the wire itself, or made loops of it to snare die fishes with, I don't
see what good their extravagant salary could be to them. I must say
it was paid with a regularity worthy of a large and honorable
trading company. For the rest, die only tiling to eat— though it
didn't look eatable in the least— I saw in their possession was a few
lumps of some stuff like half-cooked dough, of a dirty lavender
color, they kept wrapped in leaves, and now and then swallowed a
piece of, but so small that it seemed done more for die looks of
the thing than for any serious purpose of sustenance. Why in the
name of all the gnawing devils of hunger they didn't go for us—
they were thirty to five— and have a good tuck in for once, amazes
me now when I think of it. They were big powerful men, with not
much capacity to weigh the consequences, with courage, with
strength, even yet, though their skins were no longer glossy and
their muscles no longer hard. And I saw that something
restraining, one of those human secrets that baffle probability, had
come into play there. I looked at them with a swift quickening of
interest— not because it occurred to me I might be eaten by them
before very long, though I own to you that just then I perceived— in
a new light, as it were— how unwholesome the pilgrims looked, and
I hoped, yes, I positively hoped, that my aspect was not so— what
shall I say?— so— unappetizing: a touch of fantastic vanity which
fitted well with the dream-sensation that pervaded all my days at
that time. Perhaps I had a little fever too. One can't live with one's
finger everlastingly on one's pulse. I had often 'a little fever,' or a
little touch of other things— the playful paw-strokes of the wilder-
ness, die preliminary trifling before the more serious onslaught

which came in due course. Yes; I looked at diem as you would on
any human being, with a curiosity of their impulses, motives,
capacities, weaknesses, when brought to die test of an inexorable
physical necessity. Restraint! What possible restraint? Was it
superstition, disgust, patience, fear— or some kind of primitive
honor? No fear can stand up to hunger, no patience can wear it
out, disgust simply does not exist where hunger is; and as to
superstition, beliefs, and what you may call principles, they are less
dian chaff in a breeze. Don't you know die devilry of lingering
starvation, its exasperating torment, its black thoughts, its somber
and brooding ferocity? Well, I do. It takes a man all his inborn
strength to fight hunger properly. It's really easier to face
bereavement, dishonor, and the perdition of one's soul— than this
kind of prolonged hunger. Sad, but true. And these chaps too had
no eardily reason for any kind of scruple. Restraint! I would just as
soon have expected restraint from a hyena prowling amongst the
corpses of a battlefield. But there was the fact facing me— die fact
dazzling, to be seen, like die foam on the depths of die sea, like a
ripple on an unfathomable enigma, a mystery greater— when I
thought of it— than die curious, inexplicable note of desperate grief
in this savage clamor diat had swept by us on die river-bank,
behind the blind whiteness of the fog.

"Two pilgrims were quarreling in hurried whispers as to which
bank. 'Left.' 'No, no; how can you? Right, right, of course.' 'It is
very serious,' said the manager's voice behind me; 'I would be
desolated if anything should happen to Mr. Kurtz before we came
up.' I looked at him, and had not the slightest doubt he was
sincere. He was just the kind of man who would wish to preserve
appearances. That was his restraint. But when he muttered
something about going on at once, I did not even take the trouble
to answer him. I knew, and he knew, that it was impossible. Were
we to let go our hold of the bottom, we would be absolutely in the
air— in space. We wouldn't be able to tell where we were going to—
whether up or down stream, or across— till we fetched against one
bank or die other,— and then we wouldn't know at first which it
was. Of course I made no move. I had no mind for a smash-up.
You couldn't imagine a more deadly place for a shipwreck.
Wliedier drowned at once or not, we were sure to perish speedily
in one way or another. 'I audiorize you to take all the risks,' he
said, after a short silence. 'I refuse to take any,' I said shordy;
which was just die answer he expected, though its tone might have
surprised him. 'Well, I must defer to your judgment. You are cap-
tain,' he said, with marked civility. I turned my shoulder to him in
sign of my appreciation, and looked into die fog. How long would
it last? It was the most hopeless look-out. The approach to this
Kurtz grubbing for ivory in die wretched bush was beset by as
many dangers as diough he had been an enchanted princess

sleeping in a fabulous castle. 'Will they attack, do you think?'
asked the manager, in a confidential tone.

"I did not think they would attack, for several obvious reasons.
The thick fog was one. If they left the bank in their canoes they
would get lost in it, as we would be if we attempted to move. Still, I
had also judged the jungle of both banks quite impenetrable— and
yet eyes were in it, eyes that had seen us. The river-side bushes
were certainly very thick; but the undergrowth behind was
evidently penetrable. However, during the short lift I had seen no
canoes anywhere in the reach— certainly not abreast of the steamer.
But what made the idea of attack inconceivable to me was the
nature of the noise— of the cries we had heard. They had not the
fierce character boding of immediate hostile intention.
Unexpected, wild, and violent as they had been, they had given
me an irresistible impression of sorrow. The glimpse of the
steamboat had for some reason filled those savages with
unrestrained grief. The danger, if any, I expounded, was from our
proximity to a great human passion let loose. Even extreme grief
may ultimately vent itself in violence— but more generally takes the
form of apathy. . . .

"You should have seen the pilgrims stare! They had no heart
to grin, or even to revile me; but I believe they thought me gone
mad— with fright, maybe. I delivered a regular lecture. My dear
boys, it was no good bothering. Keep a look-out? Well, you may
guess I watched the fog for the signs of lifting as a cat watches a
mouse; but for anything else our eyes were of no more use to us
than if we had been buried miles deep in a heap of cotton-wool. It
felt like it too— choking, warm, stifling. Besides, all I said, though it
sounded extravagant, was absolutely true to fact. What we
afterwards alluded to as an attack was really an attempt at repulse.
The action was very far from being aggressive— it was not even
defensive, in the usual sense: it was undertaken under the stress of
desperation, and in its essence was purely protective.

"It developed itself, I should say, two hours after the fog lifted,
and its commencement was at a spot, roughly speaking, about a
mile and a half below Kurtz's station. We had just floundered and
flopped round a bend, when I saw an islet, a mere grassy
hummock of bright green, in the middle of the stream. It was the
only thing of the kind; but as we opened the reach more, I
perceived it was the head of a long sandbank, or rather of a chain
of shallow patches stretching down the middle of the river. They
were discolored, just awash, and the whole lot was seen just under
tlie water, exactly as a man's backbone is seen running down the
middle of his back under the skin. Now, as far as I did see, I could
go to the right or to the left of this. I didn't know either channel, of
course. The banks looked pretty well alike, the depth appeared
the same; but as I had been informed the station was on the west

side, I naturally headed for the western passage.

"No sooner had we fairly entered it than I became aware it was
much narrower than I had supposed. To the left of us diere was
the long uninterrupted shoal, and to the right a high, steep bank
heavily overgrown with bushes. Above the bush the trees stood in
serried ranks. The twigs overhung die current thickly, and from
distance to distance a large limb of some tree projected rigidly
over die stream. It was dien well on in the afternoon, the face of
the forest was gloomy, and a broad strip of shadow had already
fallen on die water. In diis shadow we steamed up— very slowly, as
you may imagine. I sheered her well inshore— the water being
deepest near the bank, as the sounding-pole informed me.

"One of my hungry and forbearing friends was sounding in the
bows just below me. This steamboat was exactly like a decked
scow. On die deck diere were two little teak-wood houses, with
doors and windows. The boiler was in die fore-end, and the
machinery right astern. Over the whole diere was a light roof,
supported on stanchions. The funnel projected dirough that roof,
and in front of die funnel a small cabin built of light planks served
for a pilot-house. It contained a couch, two camp-stools, a loaded
Martini-Henry leaning in one corner, a tiny table, and the steering-
wheel. It had a wide door in front and a broad shutter at each side.
All diese were always thrown open, of course. I spent my days
perched up diere on the extreme fore-end of diat roof, before the
door. At night I slept, or tried to, on the couch. An athletic black
belonging to some coast tribe, and educated by my poor
predecessor, was the helmsman. He sported a pair of brass
earrings, wore a blue cloth wrapper from the waist to the ankles,
and diought all the world of himself. He was the most unstable
kind of fool I had ever seen. He steered widi no end of a swagger
while you were by; but if he lost sight of you, he became instantly
the prey of an abject funk, and would let that cripple of a
steamboat get the upper hand of him in a minute.

"I was looking down at die sounding-pole, and feeling much
annoyed to see at each try a little more of it stick out of diat river,
when I saw my poleman give up die business suddenly, and
stretch himself flat on the deck, without even taking the trouble to
haul his pole in. He kept hold on it though, and it trailed in the
water. At die same time the fireman, whom I could also see below
me, sat down abrupdy before his furnace and ducked his head. I
was amazed. Then I had to look at die river mighty quick, because
there was a snag in die fairway. Sticks, little sticks, were flying
about— thick: they were whizzing before my nose, dropping below
me, striking behind me against my pilot-house. All this time die
river, die shore, die woods, were very quiet— perfectly quiet. I
could only hear die heavy splashing diump of die stern-wheel and
the patter of these things. We cleared die snag clumsily. Arrows,

by Jove! We were being shot at! I stepped in quickly to close the
shutter on the land side. That fool-helmsman, his hands on the
spokes, was lifting his knees high, stamping his feet, champing his
mouth, like a reined-in horse. Confound him! And we were
staggering within ten feet of the bank. I had to lean right out to
swing the heavy shutter, and I saw a face amongst the leaves on the
level with my own, looking at me very fierce and steady; and then
suddenly, as though a veil had been removed from my eyes, I
made out, deep in the tangled gloom, naked breasts, arms, legs,
glaring eyes,— die bush was swarming widi human limbs in
movement, glistening, of bronze color. The twigs shook, swayed,
and rusded, the arrows flew out of them, and then die shutter
came to. 'Steer her straight,' I said to the helmsman. He held his
head rigid, face forward; but his eyes rolled, he kept on lifting and
setting down his feet gently, his moudi foamed a little. 'Keep
quiet!' I said in a fury. I might just as well have ordered a tree not
to sway in the wind. I darted out. Below me there w r as a great
scuffle of feet on the iron deck; confused exclamations; a voice
screamed, 'Can you turn back?' I caught shape of a V-shaped
ripple on die water ahead. What? Another snag! A fusillade burst
out under my feet. The pilgrims had opened with their
Winchesters, and were simply squirting lead into tiiat bush. A
deuce of a lot of smoke came up and drove slowly forward. I
swore at it. Now I couldn't see die ripple or die snag either. I
stood in die doorway, peering, and the arrows came in swarms.
They might have been poisoned, but they looked as though they
wouldn't kill a cat. The bush began to howl. Our wood-cutters
raised a warlike whoop; die report of a rifle just at my back
deafened me. I glanced over my shoulder, and the pilot-house was
yet full of noise and smoke when I made a dash at die wheel. The
fool-nigger had dropped everything, to dirow the shutter open and
let off tiiat Martini-Henry. He stood before the wide opening,
glaring, and I yelled at him to come back, while I straightened die
sudden twist out of tiiat steamboat. There was no room to turn
even if I had wanted to, die snag was somewiiere very near ahead
in that confounded smoke, there was no time to lose, so I just
crowded her into the bank— right into the bank, where I knew r the
water was deep.

"We tore slowly along the overhanging bushes in a whirl of
broken twigs and flying leaves. The fusillade below r stopped short,
as I had foreseen it would when die squirts got empty. I threw my
head back to a glinting wiiizz that traversed die pilot-house, in at
one shutter-hole and out at the other. Looking past tiiat mad
helmsman, who was shaking the empty rifle and yelling at the
shore, I saw vague forms of men running bent double, leaping,
gliding, distinct, incomplete, evanescent . Something big appeared
in the air before the shutter, die rifle w r ent overboard, and die man

stepped back swiftly, looked at me over his shoulder in an
extraordinary, profound, familiar manner, and fell upon my feet.
The side of his head hit the wheel twice, and die end of what
appeared a long cane clattered round and knocked over a little
camp-stool. It looked as diough after wrenching that thing from
somebody ashore he had lost his balance in die effort. The thin
smoke had blown away, we were clear of die snag, and looking
ahead I could see diat in another hundred yards or so I would be
free to sheer off, away from die bank; but my feet felt so very
warm and wet that I had to look down. The man had rolled on his
back and stared straight up at me; both his hands clutched diat
cane. It was die shaft of a spear that, eidier dirown or lunged
dirough the opening, had caught him in the side just below the
ribs; the blade had gone in out of sight, after making a frightful
gash; my shoes were full; a pool of blood lay very still, gleaming
dark-red under die wheel; his eyes shone with an amazing luster.
The fusillade burst out again. He looked at me anxiously, gripping
the spear like something precious, with an air of being afraid I
would try to take it away from him. I had to make an effort to free
my eyes from his gaze and attend to the steering. With one hand I
felt above my head for die line of die steam-whistle, and jerked
out screech after screech hurriedly. The tumult of angry and
warlike yells was checked instantly, and dien from die depths of
the woods went out such a tremulous and prolonged wail of
mournful fear and utter despair as may be imagined to follow the
flight of die last hope from die earth. There was a great
commotion in the bush; the shower of arrows stopped, a few
dropping shots rang out sharply— dien silence, in which the languid
beat of die stern-wheel came plainly to my ears. I put the helm
hard a-starboard at die moment when die pilgrim in pink pyjamas,
very hot and agitated, appeared in the doorway. 'The manager
sends me—' he began in an official tone, and stopped short. 'Good
God!' he said, glaring at the wounded man.

"We two whites stood over him, and his lustrous and inquiring
glance enveloped us both. I declare it looked as though he would
presently put to us some question in an understandable language;
but he died without uttering a sound, without moving a limb,
without twitching a muscle. Only in the very last moment, as
though in response to some sign we could not see, to some
whisper we could not hear, he frowned heavily, and diat frown
gave to his black death-mask an inconceivably somber, brooding,
and menacing expression. The luster of inquiring glance faded
swiftly into vacant glassiness. 'Can you steer?' I asked the agent
eagerly. He looked very dubious; but I made a grab at his arm,
and he understood at once I meant him to steer whedier or no.
To tell you die trudi, I was morbidly anxious to change my shoes
and socks. 'He is dead,' murmured the fellow, immensely

impressed. 'No doubt about it,' said I, tugging like mad at the
shoe-laces. 'And, by the way, I suppose Mr. Kurtz is dead as well
by this time.'

"For the moment that was the dominant thought. There was a
sense of extreme disappointment, as though I had found out I had
been striving after something altogether without a substance. I
couldn't have been more disgusted if I had traveled all this way for
die sole purpose of talking with Mr. Kurtz. Talking with. ... I
flung one shoe overboard, and became aware that that was exacdy
what I had been looking forward to— a talk with Kurtz. I made the
strange discovery diat I had never imagined him as doing, you
know, but as discoursing. I didn't say to myself, 'Now I will never
see him,' or 'Now I will never shake him by the hand,' but, 'Now I
will never hear him.' The man presented himself as a voice. Not
of course that I did not connect him with some sort of action.
Hadn't I been told in all the tones of jealousy and admiration that
he had collected, bartered, swindled, or stolen more ivory than all
the other agents together. That was not the point. The point was in
his being a gifted creature, and that of all his gifts die one that
stood out preeminently, that carried with it a sense of real
presence, was his ability to talk, his words— the gift of expression,
the bewildering, die illuminating, the most exalted and die most
contemptible, die pulsating stream of light, or the deceitful flow
from die heart of an impenetrable darkness.

"The odier shoe went flying unto the devil-god of that river. I
thought, By Jove! it's all over. We are too late; he has vanished—
the gift has vanished, by means of some spear, arrow, or club. I
will never hear diat chap speak after all,— and my sorrow had a
startiing extravagance of emotion, even such as I had noticed in
the howling sorrow of diese savages in die bush. I couldn't have
felt more of lonely desolation somehow, had I been robbed of a
belief or had missed my destiny in life. . . . Why do you sigh in
this beastly way, somebody? Absurd? Well, absurd. Good Lord!
mustn't a man ever— Here, give me some tobacco." . . .

There was a pause of profound stillness, then a match flared,
and Marlow's lean face appeared, worn, hollow, with downward
folds and dropped eyelids, with an aspect of concentrated
attention; and as he took vigorous draws at his pipe, it seemed to
retreat and advance out of the night in die regular flicker of the
tiny flame. The match went out.

"Absurd!" he cried. "This is the worst of dying to tell. . . .
Here you all are, each moored with two good addresses, like a
hulk witii two anchors, a butcher round one corner, a policeman
round another, excellent appetites, and temperature normal— you
hear— normal from year's end to year's end. And you say, Absurd!
Absurd be— exploded! Absurd! My dear boys, what can you expect
from a man who out of sheer nervousness had just flung

overboard a pair of new shoes. Now I think of it, it is amazing I
did not shed tears. I am, upon the whole, proud of my fortitude. I
was cut to the quick at the idea of having lost the inestimable
privilege of listening to the gifted Kurtz. Of course I was wrong.
The privilege was waiting for me. Oh yes, I heard more than
enough. And I was right, too. A voice. He was very little more
than a voice. And I heard— him— it— this voice— other voices— all of
them were so little more than voices— and the memory of that time
itself lingers around me, impalpable, like a dying vibration of one
immense jabber, silly, atrocious, sordid, savage, or simply mean,
without any kind of sense. Voices, voices— even the girl herself—
now—"

He was silent for a long time.

"I laid the ghost of his gifts at last with a lie," he began
suddenly. "Girl! What? Did I mention a girl? Oh, she is out of it—
completely. They— die women I mean— are out of it— should be out
of it. We must help them to stay in that beautiful world of their
own, lest ours gets worse. Oh, she had to be out of it. You should
have heard the disinterred body of Mr. Kurtz saying, 'My
Intended.' You would have perceived direcdy then how
completely she was out of it. And the lofty frontal bone of Mr.
Kurtz! They say die hair goes on growing sometimes, but this— ah—
specimen, was impressively bald. The wilderness had patted him
on the head, and, behold, it was like a ball— an ivory ball; it had
caressed him, and— lo!— he had withered; it had taken him, loved
him, embraced him, got into his veins, consumed his flesh, and
sealed his soul to its own by the inconceivable ceremonies of some
devilish initiation. He was its spoiled and pampered favorite.
Ivory? I should think so. Heaps of it, stacks of it. The old mud
shanty was bursting with it. You would think there was not a single
tusk left eidier above or below the ground in die whole country.
'Mostly fossil,' the manager had remarked disparagingly. It was no
more fossil than I am; but they call it fossil when it is dug up. It
appears these niggers do bury die tusks sometimes— but evidently
they couldn't bury this parcel deep enough to save the gifted Mr.
Kurtz from his fate. We filled the steamboat with it, and had to
pile a lot on the deck. Thus he could see and enjoy as long as he
could see, because the appreciation of this favor had remained
with him to die last. You should have heard him say, 'My ivory.'
Oh yes, I heard him. 'My Intended, my ivory, my station, my
river, my—' Everything belonged to him. it made me hold my
breadi in expectation of hearing die wilderness burst into a
prodigious peal of laughter diat would shake the fixed stars in dieir
places. Everything belonged to him— but that was a trifle. The tiling
was to know what he belonged to, how many powers of darkness
claimed him for their own. That w r as the reflection that made you
creepy all over. It was impossible— it was not good for one either—

trying to imagine. He had taken a high seat amongst the devils of
the land— I mean literally. You can't understand. How could
you?— with solid pavement under your feet, surrounded by kind
neighbors ready to cheer you or to fall on you, stepping delicately
between the butcher and the policeman, in the holy terror of
scandal and gallows and lunatic asylums— how can you imagine
what particular region of the first ages a man's untrammeled feet
may take him into by the way of solitude— utter solitude without a
policeman— by the way of silence— utter silence, where no warning
voice of a kind neighbor can be heard whispering of public
opinion? These little things make all the great difference. When
they are gone you must fall back upon your own innate strength,
upon your own capacity for faithfulness. Of course you may be
too much of a fool to go wrong— too dull even to know you are
being assaulted by the powers of darkness. I take it, no fool ever
made a bargain for his soul with the devil: the fool is too much of
a fool, or the devil too much of a devil— I don't know which. Or
you may be such a thunderingly exalted creature as to be
altogether deaf and blind to anything but heavenly sights and
sounds. Then the earth for you is only a standing place— and
whether to be like this is your loss or your gain I won't pretend to
say. But most of us are neither one nor the other. The earth for us
is a place to live in, where we must put up with sights, with sounds,
with smells too, by Jove— breathe dead hippo, so to speak, and not
be contaminated. And there, don't you see? your strength comes
in, the faith in your ability for the digging of unostentatious holes
to bury the stuff in— your power of devotion, not to yourself, but to
an obscure, back-breaking business. And that's difficult enough.
Mind, I am not trying to excuse or even explain— I am trying to
account to myself for— for— Mr. Kurtz— for the shade of Mr. Kurtz.
This initiated wraith from the back of Nowhere honored me with
its amazing confidence before it vanished altogether. This was
because it could speak English to me. The original Kurtz had
been educated partly in England, and— as he was good enough to
say himself— his sympathies were in the right place. His mother
was half-English, his father was half-French. All Europe
contributed to the making of Kurtz; and by-and-by I learned that,
most appropriately, the International Society for the Suppression
of Savage Customs had intrusted him with the making of a report,
for its future guidance. And he had written it too. Eve seen it. Eve
read it. It was eloquent, vibrating with eloquence, but too high-
strung, I think. Seventeen pages of close writing he had found time
for! But this must have been before his— let us say— nerves, went
wrong, and caused him to preside at certain midnight dances
ending with unspeakable rites, which— as far as I reluctantly
gathered from what I heard at various times— were offered up to
him— do you understand?— to Mr. Kurtz himself. But it was a

beautiful piece of writing. The opening paragraph, however, in the
light of later information, strikes me now as ominous. He began
with the argument that we whites, from tire point of development
we had arrived at, 'must necessarily appear to them [savages] in
the nature of supernatural beings— we approach them with the
might as of a deity,' and so on, and-so on. 'By tire simple exercise
of our will we can exert a power for good practically unbounded,'
&c, &c. From that point he soared and took me with him. The
peroration was magnificent, though difficult to remember, you
know. It gave me the notion of an exotic Immensity ruled by an
august Benevolence. It made me tingle with enthusiasm. This was
the unbounded power of eloquence— of words— of burning noble
words. There were no practical hints to interrupt tire magic
current of phrases, unless a kind of note at the foot of the last
page, scrawled evidently much later, in an unsteady hand, may be
regarded as the exposition of a method. It was very simple, and at
the end of that moving appeal to every altruistic sentiment it
blazed at you, luminous and terrifying, like a flash of lightning in a
serene sky: 'Exterminate all the brutes!' The curious part was that
he had apparently forgotten all about that valuable postscriptum,
because, later on, when he in a sense came to himself, he
repeatedly entreated me to take good care of 'my pamphlet' (he
called it), as it was sure to have in tire future a good influence upon
his career. I had full information about all these things, and,
besides, as it turned out, I was to have the care of his memory. I've
done enough for it to give me the indisputable right to lay it, if I
choose, for an everlasting rest in tire dust-bin of progress, amongst
all tire sweepings and, figuratively speaking, all tire dead cats of
civilization. But then, you see, I can't choose. He won't be
forgotten. Whatever he was, he was not common. He had the
power to charm or frighten rudimentary souls into an aggravated
witch-dance in his honor; he could also fill the small souls of the
pilgrims with bitter misgivings: he had one devoted friend at least,
and he had conquered one soul in tire world that was neither
rudimentary nor tainted with self-seeking. No; I can't forget him,
though I am not prepared to affirm tire fellow was exactly worth
the life we lost in getting to him. I missed my late helmsman
awfully,— I missed him even while his body was still lying in the
pilot-house. Perhaps you will think it passing strange this regret for
a savage who was no more account than a grain of sand in a black
Sahara. Well, don't you see, he had done something, he had
steered; for months I had him at my back— a help— an instrument.
It was a kind of partnership. He steered for me— I had to look
after him, I worried about his deficiencies, and thus a subtle bond
had been created, of which I only became aware when it was
suddenly broken. And the intimate profundity of that look he gave
me when he received his hurt remains to this day in my memory—

like a claim of distant kinship affirmed in a supreme moment
"Poor fool! If he had only left that shutter alone. He had
no restraint, no restraint— just like Kurtz— a tree swayed by the
wind; As soon as I had put on a dry pair of slippers, I dragged him
out, after first jerking the spear out of his side, which operation I
confess I performed with my eyes shut tight. His heels leaped
together over the little door-step; his shoulders were pressed to my
breast; I hugged him from behind desperately. Oh! he was heavy,
heavy; heavier than any man on earth, I should imagine. Then
without more ado I tipped him overboard. The current snatched
him as though he had been a wisp of grass, and I saw the body roll
over twice before I lost sight of it for ever. All the pilgrims and the
manager were then congregated on the awning-deck about the
pilot-house, chattering at each other like a flock of excited
magpies, and there was a scandalized murmur at my heartless
promptitude. What they wanted to keep that body hanging about
for I can't guess. Embalm it, maybe. But I had also heard another,
and a very ominous, murmur on the deck below. My friends the
wood-cutters were likewise scandalized, and with a better show of
reason— though I admit that the reason itself was quite
inadmissible. Oh, quite! I had made up my mind that if my late
helmsman was to be eaten, the fishes alone should have him. He
had been a very second-rate helmsman while alive, but now he was
dead he might have become a first-class temptation, and possibly
cause some startling trouble. Besides, I was anxious to take the
wheel, the man in pink pyjamas showing himself a hopeless duffer
at the business.

"This I did directly the simple funeral was over. We were
going half-speed, keeping right in the middle of the stream, and I
listened to the talk about me. They had given up Kurtz, they had
given up the station; Kurtz was dead, and the station had been
burnt— and so on— and so on. The red-haired pilgrim was beside
himself with the thought that at least this poor Kurtz had been
properly revenged. 'Say! We must have made a glorious slaughter
of them in the bush. Eh? What do you think? Say?' He positively
danced, the bloodthirsty little gingery beggar. And he had nearly
fainted when he saw the wounded man! I could not help saying,
'You made a glorious lot of smoke, anyhow.' I had seen, from the
way the tops of the bushes rustled and flew, that almost all the
shots had gone too high. You can't hit anything unless you take
aim and fire from the shoulder; but these chaps fired from the hip
with their eyes shut. The retreat, I maintained— and I was right-
was caused by the screeching of the steam-whistle. Upon this they
forgot Kurtz, and began to howl at me with indignant protests.

"The manager stood by the wheel murmuring confidentially
about the necessity of getting well away down the river before dark
at all events, when I saw in the distance a clearing on the river-side

and die oudines of some sort of building. 'What's diis?' I asked.
He clapped his hands in wonder. 'The station!' he cried. I edged
in at once, still going half-speed.

"Through my glasses I saw die slope of a hill interspersed with
rare trees and perfecdy free from undergrowth. A long decaying
building on the summit was half buried in the high grass; die large
holes in die peaked roof gaped black from afar; die jungle and die
woods made a background. There was no inclosure or fence of
any kind; but there had been one apparendy, for near die house
half-a-dozen slim posts remained in a row, roughly trimmed, and
with their upper ends ornamented widi round carved balls. The
rails, or whatever diere had been between, had disappeared. Of
course the forest surrounded all diat. The river-bank was clear,
and on die water-side I saw a white man under a hat like a cart-
wheel beckoning persistently with his whole arm. Examining the
edge of the forest above and below, I was almost certain I could
see movements— human forms gliding here and there. I steamed
past prudently, then stopped the engines and let her drift down.
The man on die shore began to shout, urging us to land. 'We have
been attacked,' screamed die manager. 'I know— I know. It's all
right,' yelled back the other, as cheerful as you please. 'Come
along. It's all right. I am glad.'

"His aspect reminded me of something I had seen— something
funny I had seen somewhere. As I maneuvered to get alongside, I
was asking myself, 'What does this fellow look like?' Suddenly I
got it. He looked like a harlequin. His clothes had been made of
some stuff that was brown holland probably, but it was covered
with patches all over, with bright patches, blue, red, and yellow,—
patches on the back, patches on front, patches on elbows, on
knees; colored binding round his jacket, scarlet edging at the
bottom of his trousers; and the sunshine made him look
extremely gay and wonderfully neat withal, because you could see
how beautifully all this patching had been done. A beardless,
boyish face, very fair, no features to speak of, nose peeling, little
blue eyes, smiles and frowns chasing each odier over diat open
countenance like sunshine and shadow on a windswept plain.
'Look out, captain!' he cried; 'diere's a snag lodged in here last
night.' What! Anodier snag? I confess I swore shamefully. I had
nearly holed my cripple, to finish off diat charming trip. The
harlequin on die bank turned his little pug nose up to me. 'You
English?' he asked, all smiles. 'Are you?' I shouted from the
wheel. The smiles vanished, and he shook his head as if sorry for
my disappointment. Then he brightened up. 'Never mind!' he
cried encouragingly. 'Are we in time?' I asked. 'He is up there,' he
replied, with a toss of die head up die hill, and becoming gloomy
all of a sudden. His face was like die autumn sky, overcast one
moment and bright die next.

"When die manager, escorted by die pilgrims, all of diem
armed to the teeth, had gone to the house, this chap came on
board. 'I say, I don't like diis. These natives are in die bush,' I
said. He assured me earnestly it was all right. 'They are simple
people,' he added; 'well, I am glad you came. It took me all my
time to keep them off.' 'But you said it was all right,' I cried. 'Oh,
they meant no harm,' he said; and as I stared he corrected
himself, 'Not exacdy.' Then vivaciously, 'My faith, your pilot-
house wants a clean up!' In die next breath he advised me to keep
enough steam on die boiler to blow die whistle in case of any
trouble. 'One good screech will do more for you than all your
rifles. They are simple people,' he repeated. He rattled away at
such a rate he quite overwhelmed me. He seemed to be trying to
make up for lots of silence, and actually hinted, laughing, diat such
was the case. 'Don't you talk with Mr. Kurtz?' I said. 'You don't
talk with that man— you listen to him,' he exclaimed with severe
exaltation. 'But now—' He waved his arm, and in the twinkling of
an eye was in the uttermost depths of despondency. In a moment
he came up again with a jump, possessed himself of both my
hands, shook them continuously, while he gabbled: 'Brodier sailor
. . . honor . . . pleasure . . . delight . . . introduce myself . . .
Russian . . . son of an arch-priest . . . Government of Tambov . . .
What? Tobacco! English tobacco; die excellent English tobacco!
Now, diat's brotherly. Smoke? Where's a sailor diat does not
smoke?'

"The pipe soothed him, and gradually I made out he had run
away from school, had gone to sea in a Russian ship; ran away
again; served some time in English ships; was now reconciled with
die arch-priest. He made a point of that. 'But when one is young
one must see things, gather experience, ideas; enlarge die mind.'
'Here!' I interrupted. 'You can never tell! Here I have met Mr.
Kurtz,' he said, youdifully solemn and reproachful. I held my
tongue after diat. It appears he had persuaded a Dutch trading-
house on the coast to fit him out widi stores and goods, and had
started for the interior with a light heart, and no more idea of what
would happen to him than a baby. He had been wandering about
that river for nearly two years alone, cut off from everybody and
everything. 'I am not so young as I look. I am twenty-five,' he said.
'At first old Van Shuyten would tell me to go to die devil,' he
narrated with keen enjoyment; 'but I stuck to him, and talked and
talked, till at last he got afraid I would talk die hind-leg off his
favorite dog, so he gave me some cheap things and a few guns, and
told me he hoped he would never see my face again. Good old
Dutchman, Van Shuyten. I've sent him one small lot of ivory a
year ago, so that he can't call me a little thief when I get back. I
hope he got it. And for die rest I don't care. I had some wood
stacked for you. That was my old house. Did you see?'

"I gave him Towson's book. He made as though he would kiss
me, but restrained himself. 'The only book I had left, and I
thought I had lost it,' he said, looking at it ecstatically. 'So many
accidents happen to a man going about alone, you know. Canoes
get upset sometimes— and sometimes you've got to clear out so
quick when the people get angry.' He thumbed the pages. 'You
made notes in Russian?' I asked. He nodded. 'I thought they were
written in cipher,' I said. He laughed, then became serious. 'I had
lots of trouble to keep these people off,' he said. 'Did they want to
kill you?' I asked. 'Oh no!' he cried, and checked himself. 'Why
did they attack us?' I pursued. He hesitated, tiien said
shamefacedly, 'They don't want him to go.' 'Don't they?' I said,
curiously. He nodded a nod full of mystery and wisdom. 'I tell
you,' he cried, 'this man has enlarged my mind.' He opened his
arms wide, staring at me widi his little blue eyes that were perfectly
round."

Ill

"I looked at him, lost in astonishment. There he was before
me, in motley, as diough he had absconded from a troupe of
mimes, enthusiastic, fabulous. His very existence was improbable,
inexplicable, and altogedier bewildering. He was an insoluble
problem. It was inconceivable how he had existed, how he had
succeeded in getting so far, how he had managed to remain why
he did not instandy disappear. 'I went a little farther,' he said,
'then still a little fardier— till I had gone so far that I don't know
how I'll ever get back. Never mind. Plenty time. I can manage.
You take Kurtz away quick— quick— I tell you.' The glamour of
youth enveloped his particolored rags, his destitution, his
loneliness, the essential desolation of his futile wanderings. For
months— for years— his life hadn't been worth a day's purchase;
and diere he was gallantly, thoughtlessly alive, to all appearance
indestructible solely by die virtue of his few years and of his
unreflecting audacity. I was seduced into something like
admiration— like envy. Glamour urged him on, glamour kept him
unscathed. He surely wanted nothing from die wilderness but
space to breathe in and to push on through. His need was to exist,
and to move onwards at die greatest possible risk, and with a
maximum of privation. If the absolutely pure, uncalculating,
unpractical spirit of adventure had ever ruled a human being, it
ruled this be-patched youth. I almost envied him the possession of
this modest and clear flame. It seemed to have consumed all
thought of self so completely, that, even while he was talking to
you, you forgot that it was he— die man before your eyes— who had
gone through these things. I did not envy him his devotion to

Kurtz, though. He had not meditated over it. It came to him, and
he accepted it with a sort of eager fatalism. I must say that to me it
appeared about the most dangerous thing in every way he had
come upon so far.

"They had come together unavoidably, like two ships
becalmed near each other, and lay rubbing sides at last. I suppose
Kurtz wanted an audience, because on a certain occasion, when
encamped in the forest, they had talked all night, or more
probably Kurtz had talked. 'We talked of everything,' he said,
quite transported at the recollection. 'I forgot there was such a
thing as sleep. The night did not seem to last an hour. Everything!
Everything! . . .Of love too.' 'Ah, he talked to you of love!' I said,
much amused. 'It isn't what you think,' he cried, almost
passionately. 'It was in general. He made me see tilings— things.'

"He threw his arms up. We were on deck at the time, and the
headman of my wood-cutters, lounging near by, turned upon him
his heavy and glittering eyes. I looked around, and I don't know
why, but I assure you that never, never before, did this land, this
river, this jungle, the very arch of this blazing sky, appear to me so
hopeless and so dark, so impenetrable to human thought, so
pitiless to human weakness. 'And, ever since, you have been with
him, of course?' I said.

"On the contrary. It appears their intercourse had been very
much broken by various causes. He had, as he informed me
proudly, managed to nurse Kurtz through two illnesses (he alluded
to it as you would to some risky feat), but as a rule Kurtz
wandered alone, far in the depths of the forest. 'Very often coming
to this station, I had to wait days and days before he would turn
up,' he said. 'All, it was worth waiting for!— sometimes.' 'What was
he doing? exploring or what?' I asked. 'Oh yes, of course;' he had
discovered lots of villages, a lake too— he did not know exactly in
what direction; it was dangerous to inquire too much— but mostly
his expeditions had been for ivory. 'But he had no goods to trade
with by that time,' I objected. 'There's a good lot of cartridges left
even yet,' he answered, looking away. 'To speak plainly, he raided
the country,' I said. He nodded. 'Not alone, surely!' He muttered
something about the villages round that lake. 'Kurtz got the tribe
to follow him, did he?' I suggested. He fidgeted a little. 'They
adored him,' he said. The tone of these words was so
extraordinary that I looked at him searchingly. It was curious to
see his mingled eagerness and reluctance to speak of Kurtz. The
man filled bis life, occupied his thoughts, swayed his emotions.
'What can you expect?' he burst out; 'he came to them with
thunder and lightning, you know— and they had never seen
anything like it— and very terrible. He could be very terrible. You
can't judge Mr. Kurtz as you would an ordinary man. No, no, no!
Now— just to give you an idea— I don't mind telling you, he wanted

to shoot me too one day— but I don't judge him.' 'Shoot you!' I
cried. 'What for?' 'Well, I had a small lot of ivory die chief of that
village near my house gave me. You see I used to shoot game for
them. Well, he wanted it, and wouldn't hear reason. He declared
he would shoot me unless I gave him the ivory and dien cleared
out of the country, because he could do so, and had a fancy for it,
and diere was nothing on earth to prevent him killing whom he
jolly well pleased. And it was true too. I gave him the ivory. What
did I care! But I didn't clear out. No, no. I couldn't leave him. I
had to be careful, of course, till we got friendly again for a time.
He had his second illness then. Afterwards I had to keep out of
the way; but I didn't mind. He was living for die most part in those
villages on the lake. When he came down to die river, sometimes
he would take to me, and sometimes it was better for me to be
careful. This man suffered too much. He hated all this, and
somehow he couldn't get away. When I had a chance I begged
him to try and leave while there was time; I offered to go back with
him. And he would say yes, and then he would remain; go off on
another ivory hunt; disappear for weeks; forget himself amongst
these people— forget himself— you know.' 'Why! he's mad,' I said.
He protested indignandy. Mr. Kurtz couldn't be mad. If I had
heard him talk, only two days ago, I wouldn't dare hint at such a
thing. ... I had taken up my binoculars while we talked and was
looking at the shore, sweeping the limit of the forest at each side
and at die back of die house. The consciousness of there being
people in that bush, so silent, so quiet— as silent and quiet as the
ruined house on the hill— made me uneasy. There was no sign on
the face of nature of this amazing tale diat was not so much told as
suggested to me in desolate exclamations, completed by shrugs, in
interrupted phrases, in hints ending in deep sighs. The woods
were unmoved, like a mask— heavy, like the closed door of a
prison— they looked with their air of hidden knowledge, of patient
expectation, of unapproachable silence. The Russian was
explaining to me diat it was only lately diat Mr. Kurtz had come
down to the river, bringing along with him all die fighting men of
that lake tribe. He had been absent for several months— getting
himself adored, I suppose— and had come down unexpectedly,
with the intention to all appearance of making a raid eidier across
the river or down stream. Evidently the appetite for more ivory
had got die better of the— what shall I say?— less material
aspirations. However he had got much worse suddenly. 'I heard
he was lying helpless, and so I came up— took my chance,' said the
Russian. 'Oh, he is bad, very bad.' I directed my glass to die
house. There were no signs of life, but diere was the ruined roof,
the long mud wall peeping above die grass, with three little square
window-holes, no two of die same size; all this brought within
reach of my hand, as it were. And dien I made a brusque

movement, and one of die remaining posts of diat vanished fence
leaped up in the field of my glass. You remember I told you I had
been struck at die distance by certain attempts at ornamentation,
rather remarkable in die ruinous aspect of the place. Now I had
suddenly a nearer view, and its first result was to make me throw
my head back as if before a blow. Then I went carefully from post
to post widi my glass, and I saw my mistake. These round knobs
were not ornamental but symbolic; they were expressive and
puzzling, striking and disturbing— food for diought and also for the
vultures if diere had been any looking down from die sky; but at
all events for such ants as were industrious enough to ascend die
pole. They would have been even more impressive, diose heads
on the stakes, if their faces had not been turned to die house. Only
one, die first I had made out, was facing my way. I was not so
shocked as you may think. The start back I had given was really
nothing but a movement of surprise. I had expected to see a knob
of wood there, you know. I returned deliberately to the first I had
seen— and diere it was, black, dried, sunken, with closed eyelids,— a
head tiiat seemed to sleep at the top of diat pole, and, with the
shrunken dry lips showing a narrow white line of the teeth, was
smiling too, smiling continuously at some endless and jocose
dream of that eternal slumber.

"I am not disclosing any trade secrets. In fact die manager said
afterwards that Mr. Kurtz's mediods had ruined die district. I have
no opinion on that point, but I want you clearly to understand that
there was nodiing exactly profitable in these heads being there.
They only showed that Mr. Kurtz lacked restraint in the
gratification of his various lusts, diat diere was something wanting
in him— some small matter which, when the pressing need arose,
could not be found under his magnificent eloquence. Whedier he
knew of this deficiency himself I can't say. I think the knowledge
came to him at last— only at die very last. But the wilderness had
found him out early, and had taken on him a terrible vengeance
for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things
about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no
conception till he took counsel widi diis great solitude— and the
whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within
him because he was hollow at the core. ... I put down die glass,
and die head that had appeared near enough to be spoken to
seemed at once to have leaped away from me into inaccessible
distance.

"The admirer of Mr. Kurtz was a bit crestfallen. In a hurried,
indistinct voice he began to assure me he had not dared to take
these— say, symbols— down. He was not afraid of the natives; they
would not stir till Mr. Kurtz gave die word. His ascendency was
extraordinary. The camps of diese people surrounded the place,
and the chiefs came every day to see him. They would crawl. ... 'I

don't want to know anything of the ceremonies used when
approaching Mr. Kurtz,' I shouted. Curious, this feeling that came
over me that such details would be more intolerable than those
heads drying on the stakes under Mr. Kurtz's windows. After all,
that was only a savage sight, while I seemed at one bound to have
been transported into some lightless region of subtle horrors,
where pure, uncomplicated savagery was a positive relief, being
something that had a right to exist— obviously— in the sunshine.
The young man looked at me with surprise. I suppose it did not
occur to him Mr. Kurtz was no idol of mine. He forgot I hadn't
heard any of these splendid monologues on, what was it? on love,
justice, conduct of life— or what not. If it had come to crawling
before Mr. Kurtz, he crawled as much as the veriest savage of
them all. I had no idea of the conditions, he said: these heads
were the heads of rebels. I shocked him excessively by laughing.
Rebels! What would be the next definition I was to hear? There
had been enemies, criminals, workers— and these were rebels.
Those rebellious heads looked very subdued to me on their sticks.
'You don't know how such a life tries a man like Kurtz,' cried
Kurtz's last disciple. 'Well, and you?' I said. 'I! I! I am a simple
man. I have no great thoughts. I want nothing from anybody. How
can you compare me to . . . ?' His feelings were too much for
speech, and suddenly he broke down. 'I don't understand,' he
groaned. 'I've been doing my best to keep him alive, and that's
enough. I had no hand in all this. I have no abilities. There hasn't
been a drop of medicine or a mouthful of invalid food for months
here. He was shamefully abandoned. A man like this, with such
ideas. Shamefully! Shamefully! I— I— haven't slept for the last ten
nights.

"His voice lost itself in the calm of the evening. The long
shadows of the forest had slipped down hill while we talked, had
gone far beyond the ruined hovel, beyond the symbolic row of
stakes. All this was in the gloom, while we down there were yet in
the sunshine, and the stretch of the river abreast of the clearing
glittered in a still and dazzling splendor, with a murky and over-
shadowed bend above and below. Not a living soul was seen on
the shore. The bushes did not rustle.

"Suddenly round the corner of the house a group of men
appeared, as though they had come up from the ground. They
waded waist-deep in the grass, in a compact body, bearing an
improvised stretcher in their midst. Instantly, in the emptiness of
the landscape, a cry arose whose shrillness pierced the still air like
a sharp arrow flying straight to the very heart of the land; and, as if
by enchantment, streams of human beings— of naked human
beings— with spears in their hands, with bows, with shields, with
wild glances and savage movements, were poured into the clearing
by the dark-faced and pensive forest. The bushes shook, the grass

swayed for a time, and then everything stood still in attentive
immobility.

'"Now, if he does not say the right thing to diem we are all
done for,' said die Russian at my elbow. The knot of men with the
stretcher had stopped too, half-way to die steamer, as if petrified. I
saw die man on die stretcher sit up, lank and with an uplifted arm,
above the shoulders of die bearers. 'Let us hope diat the man who
can talk so well of love in general will find some particular reason
to spare us this time,' I said. I resented bitterly die absurd danger
of our situation, as if to be at the mercy of that atrocious phantom
had been a dishonoring necessity. I could not hear a sound, but
through my glasses I saw the thin arm extended commandingly,
the lower jaw moving, die eyes of diat apparition shining darkly far
in its bony head that nodded with grotesque jerks. Kurtz— Kurtz—
diat means short in German— don't it? Well, die name was as true
as everything else in his life— and death. He looked at least seven
feet long. His covering had fallen off, and his body emerged from
it pitiful and appalling as from a winding-sheet. I could see die
cage of his ribs all astir, the bones of his arm waving. It was as
though an animated image of deadi carved out of old ivory had
been shaking its hand with menaces at a motionless crowd of men
made of dark and glittering bronze. I saw him open his mouth
wide— it gave him a weirdly voracious aspect, as diough he had
wanted to swallow all die air, all die eardi, all the men before him.
A deep voice reached me faintly. He must have been shouting. He
fell back suddenly. The stretcher shook as die bearers staggered
forward again, and almost at die same time I noticed diat the
crowd of savages was vanishing without any perceptible movement
of retreat, as if the forest diat had ejected diese beings so suddenly
had drawn them in again as die breadi is drawn in a long
aspiration.

"Some of the pilgrims behind the stretcher carried his arms-
two shot-guns, a heavy rifle, and a light revolver-carbine— the
diunderbolts of that pitiful Jupiter. The manager bent over him
murmuring as he walked beside his head. They laid him down in
one of die little cabins— just a room for a bed-place and a camp-
stool or two, you know. We had brought his belated
correspondence, and a lot of torn envelopes and open letters
littered his bed. His hand roamed feebly amongst these papers. I
was struck by the fire of his eyes and die composed languor of his
expression. It was not so much die exhaustion of disease. He did
not seem in pain. This shadow looked satiated and calm, as
diough for die moment it had had its fill of all die emotions.

"He rustled one of the letters, and looking straight in my face
said, 'I am glad.' Somebody had been writing to him about me.
These special recommendations were turning up again. The
volume of tone he emitted without effort, almost without the

trouble of moving his lips, amazed me. A voice! a voice! It was
grave, profound, vibrating, while the man did not seem capable of
a whisper. However, he had enough strength in him— factitious no
doubt— to very nearly make an end of us, as you shall hear directly.

"The manager appeared silently in the doorway; I stepped out
at once and he drew the curtain after me. The Russian, eyed
curiously by the pilgrims, was staling at the shore. I followed the
direction of his glance.

"Dark human shapes could be made out in die distance,
flitting indistincdy against die gloomy border of the forest, and
near the river two bronze figures, leaning on tall spears, stood in
die sunlight under fantastic headdresses of spotted skins, warlike
and still in statuesque repose. And from right to left along the
lighted shore moved a wild and gorgeous apparition of a woman.

"She walked with measured steps, draped in striped and
fringed cloths, treading the eardi proudly, widi a slight jingle and
flash of barbarous ornaments. She carried her head high; her hair
was done in the shape of a helmet; she had brass leggings to die
knee, brass wire gaundets to the elbow, a crimson spot on her
tawny cheek, innumerable necklaces of glass beads on her neck;
bizarre things, charms, gifts of witch-men, diat hung about her,
glittered and trembled at every step. She must have had the value
of several elephant tusks upon her. She was savage and superb,
wild-eyed and magnificent; tiiere was something ominous and
stately in her deliberate progress. And in the hush diat had fallen
suddenly upon die whole sorrowful land, the immense wilderness,
the colossal body of die fecund and mysterious life seemed to
look at her, pensive, as though it had been looking at die image of
its own tenebrous and passionate soul.

"She came abreast of die steamer, stood still, and faced us.
Her long shadow fell to die water's edge. Her face had a tragic and
fierce aspect of wild sorrow and of dumb pain mingled with the
fear of some struggling, half-shaped resolve. She stood looking at
us without a stir and like the wilderness itself, with an air of brood-
ing over an inscrutable purpose. A whole minute passed, and then
she made a step forward. There was a low jingle, a glint of yellow
metal, a sway of fringed draperies, and she stopped as if her heart
had failed her. The young fellow by my side growled. The pilgrims
murmured at my back. She looked at us all as if her life had
depended upon the unswerving steadiness of her glance. Suddenly
she opened her bared arms and direw diem up rigid above her
head, as though in an uncontrollable desire to touch the sky, and
at the same time the swift shadows darted out on the earth, swept
around on die river, gathering die steamer into a shadowy em-
brace. A formidable silence hung over the scene.

"She turned away slowly, walked on, following die bank, and
passed into die bushes to die left. Once only her eyes gleamed

back at us in the dusk of the thickets before she disappeared.

'"If she had offered to come aboard I really think I Would
have tried to shoot her,' said the man of patches, nervously. 'I had
been risking my life every day for the last fortnight to keep her out
of the house. She got in one day and kicked up a row about those
miserable rags I picked up in the storeroom to mend my clothes
with. I wasn't decent. At least it must have been that, for she talked
like a fury to Kurtz for an hour, pointing at me now and then. I
don't understand the dialect of this tribe. Luckily for me, I fancy
Kurtz felt too ill that day to care, or there would have been mis-
chief. I don't understand. . . . No— it's too much for me. Ah, well,
it's all over now.'

"At this moment I heard Kurtz's deep voice behind the
curtain, 'Save me!— save die ivory, you mean. Don't tell me. Save
me! Why, I've had to save you. You are interrupting my plans
now. Sick! Sick! Not so sick as you would like to believe. Never
mind. I'll carry my ideas out yet— I will return. I'll show you what
can be done. You with your little peddling notions— you are
interfering with me. I will return. I. . . .'

"The manager came out. He did me the honor to take me
under the arm and lead me aside. 'He is very low, very low,' he
said. He considered it necessary to sigh, but neglected to be
consistently sorrowful. 'We have done all we could for him—
haven't we? But there is no disguising the fact, Mr. Kurtz has done
more harm than good to the Company. He did not see the time
was not ripe for vigorous action. Cautiously, cautiously— that's my
principle. We must be cautious yet. The district is closed to us for
a time. Deplorable! Upon the whole, the trade will suffer. I don't
deny there is a remarkable quantity of ivory— mostly fossil. We
must save it, at all events— but look how precarious the position is—
and why? Because the method is unsound.' 'Do you,' said I,
looking at the shore, 'call it "unsound method"?' 'Without doubt,'
he exclaimed, hotly. 'Don't you?' . . . 'No method at all,' I
murmured after a while. 'Exactly' he exulted. 'I anticipated this.
Shows a complete want of judgment. It is my duty to point it out in
the proper quarter.' 'Oh,' said I, 'that fellow— what's his name?—
the brickmaker, will make a readable report for you.' He
appeared confounded for a moment. It seemed to me I had never
breathed an atmosphere so vile, and I turned mentally to Kurtz
for relief— positively for relief. 'Nevertheless I think Mr. Kurtz is a
remarkable man,' I said with emphasis. He started, dropped on
me a cold heavy glance, said very quietly, 'He wa5,'and turned his
back on me. My hour of favor was over; I found myself lumped
along with Kurtz as a partisan of methods for which the time was
not ripe: I was unsound! All! but it was something to have at least a
choice of nightmares.

"I had turned to the wilderness really, not to Mr. Kurtz, who, I

was ready to admit, was as good as buried. And for a moment it
seemed to me as if I also were buried in a vast grave full of
unspeakable secrets. I felt an intolerable weight oppressing my
breast, the smell of die damp earth, die unseen presence of
victorious corruption, die darkness of an impenetrable night. . . .
The Russian tapped me on the shoulder. I heard him mumbling
and stammering something about 'brother seaman— couldn't
conceal— knowledge of matters that would affect Mr. Kurtz's
reputation.' I waited. For him evidently Mr. Kurtz was not in his
grave; I suspect diat for him Mr. Kurtz was one of die immortals.
'Well!' said I at last, 'speak out. As it happens, I am Mr. Kurtz's
friend— in a way.'

"He stated with a good deal of formality diat had we not been
'of die same profession,' he would have kept the matter to himself
without regard to consequences. 'He suspected diere was an active
ill-will towards him on die part of these white men that—' 'You are
right,' I said, remembering a certain conversation I had overheard.
'The manager diinks you ought to be hanged.' He showed a
concern at this intelligence which amused me at first. 'I had better
get out of the way quiedy,' he said, earnesdy. 'I can do no more
for Kurtz now, and they would soon find some excuse. What's to
stop them? There's a military post three hundred miles from
here.' 'Well, upon my word,' said I, 'perhaps you had better go if
you have any friends amongst the savages near by.' 'Plenty,' he
said. 'They are simple people— and I want nodiing, you know.' He
stood biting his lip, then: 'I don't want any harm to happen to
these whites here, but of course I was thinking of Mr. Kurtz's
reputation— but you are a brother seaman and—' 'All right,' said I,
after a time. 'Mr. Kurtz's reputation is safe with me.' I did not
know how truly I spoke.

"He informed me, lowering his voice, that it was Kurtz who
had ordered die attack to be made on die steamer. 'He hated
sometimes the idea of being taken away— and then again. . . . But I
don't understand these matters. I am a simple man. He diought it
would scare you away— diat you would give it up, thinking him
dead. I could not stop him. Oh, I had an awful time of it this last
month.' 'Very well,' I said. 'He is all right now.' 'Ye-e-es,' he
muttered, not very convinced apparendy. 'Thanks,' said I; 'I shall
keep my eyes open.' 'But quiet— eh?' he urged, anxiously. 'It
would be awful for his reputation if anybody here—' I promised a
complete discretion with great gravity. 'I have a canoe and three
black fellows waiting not very far. I am off. Could you give me a
few Martini-Henry cartridges?' I could, and did, widi proper
secrecy. He helped himself, with a wink at me, to a handful of my
tobacco. 'Between sailors— you know— good English tobacco.' At
the door of die pilot-house he turned round— 'I say, haven't you a
pair of shoes you could spare?' He raised one leg. 'Look.' The

soles were tied with knotted strings sandal-wise under his bare feet.
I rooted out an old pair, at which he looked with admiration be-
fore tucking it under his left arm. One of his pockets (bright red)
was bulging with cartridges, from the other (dark blue) peeped
'Towson's Inquiry,' &c, &c. He seemed to think himself
excellently well equipped for a renewed encounter with the
wilderness. 'All! I'll never, never meet such a man again. You
ought to have heard him recite poetry— his own too it was, he told
me. Poetry!' He rolled his eyes at the recollection of these
delights. 'Oh, he enlarged my mind!' 'Good-by,' said I. He shook
hands and vanished in the night. Sometimes I ask myself whether
I had ever really seen him— whether it was possible to meet such a
phenomenon! . . .

"When I woke up shortly after midnight his warning came to
my mind with its hint of danger that seemed, in the starred
darkness, real enough to make me get up for the purpose of
having a look round. On the hill a big fire burned, illuminating
fitfully a crooked corner of the station-house. One of the agents
with a picket of a few of our blacks, armed for the purpose, was
keeping guard over the ivory; but deep within the forest, red
gleams that wavered, that seemed to sink and rise from the ground
amongst confused columnar shapes of intense blackness, showed
the exact position of the camp where Mr. Kurtz's adorers were
keeping their uneasy vigil. The monotonous beating of a big drum
filled die air with muffled shocks and a lingering vibration. A
steady droning sound of many men chanting each to himself some
weird incantation came out from the black, flat wall of the woods
as the humming of bees comes out of a hive, and had a strange
narcotic effect upon my half-awake senses. I believe I dozed off
leaning over the rail, till an abrupt burst of yells, an overwhelming
outbreak of a pent-up and mysterious frenzy, woke me up in a
bewildered w r onder. It was cut short all at once, and the low
droning w r ent on with an effect of audible and soo tiling silence. I
glanced casually into the little cabin. A light was burning within,
but Mr. Kurtz was not there.

"I think I would have raised an outcry if I had believed my
eyes. But I didn't believe them at first— the thing seemed so
impossible. The fact is I was completely unnerved by a sheer
blank fright, pure abstract terror, unconnected with any distinct
shape of physical danger. What made this emotion so
overpowering was— how shall I define it?— the moral shock I
received, as if something altogether monstrous, intolerable to
thought and odious to the soul, had been thrust upon me
unexpectedly. This lasted of course the merest fraction of a
second, and then the usual sense of commonplace, deadly danger,
the possibility of a sudden onslaught and massacre, or something
of the kind, which I saw impending, was positively welcome and

composing. It pacified me, in fact, so much, that I did not raise an
alarm.

"There was an agent buttoned up inside an ulster and sleeping
on a chair on deck within three feet of me. The yells had not
awakened him; he snored very slightly; I left him to his slumbers
and leaped ashore. I did not betray Mr. Kurtz— it was ordered I
should never betray him— it was written I should be loyal to the
nightmare of my choice. I was anxious to deal with this shadow by
myself alone,— and to this day I don't know why I was so jealous of
sharing with anyone the peculiar blackness of that experience.

"As soon as I got on the bank I saw a trail— a broad trail
through the grass. I remember the exultation with which I said to
myself, 'He can't walk— he is crawling on all-fours— I've got him.'
The grass was wet with dew. I strode rapidly with clenched fists. I
fancy I had some vague notion of falling upon him and giving him
a drubbing. I don't know. I had some imbecile thoughts. The
knitting old woman with the cat obtruded herself upon my
memory as a most improper person to be sitting at the other end
of such an affair. I saw a row of pilgrims squirting lead in the air
out of Winchesters held to the hip. I thought I would never get
back to die steamer, and imagined myself living alone and
unarmed in the woods to an advanced age. Such silly things— you
know. And I remember I confounded the beat of the drum with
the beating of my heart, and was pleased at its calm regularity.

"I kept to the track though— then stopped to listen. The night
was very clear: a dark blue space, sparkling with dew r and starlight,
in which black things stood very still. I thought I could see a kind
of motion ahead of me. I was strangely cocksure of everything that
night. I actually left the track and ran in a wide semicircle (I verily
believe chuckling to myself) so as to get in front of that stir, of that
motion I had seen— if indeed I had seen anything. I was
circumventing Kurtz as though it had been a boyish game.

"I came upon him, and, if he had not heard me coming, I
would have fallen over him too, but he got up in time. He rose,
unsteady, long, pale, indistinct, like a vapor exhaled by the earth,
and sw r ayed slightly, misty and silent before me; while at my back
the fires loomed between the trees, and the murmur of many
voices issued from the forest. I had cut him off cleverly; but when
actually confronting him I seemed to come to my senses, I saw the
danger in its right proportion. It was by no means over yet.
Suppose he began to shout? Though he could hardly stand, there
was still plenty of vigor in his voice. 'Go away— hide yourself,' he
said, in that profound tone. It was very awful. I glanced back. We
were within thirty yards from the nearest fire. A black figure stood
up, strode on long black legs, waving long black arms, across the
glow. It had horns— antelope horns, I think— on its head. Some
sorcerer, some witch-man, no doubt: it looked fiend-like enough.

'Do you know what you are doing?' I whispered. 'Perfectly,' he
answered, raising his voice for that single word: it sounded to me
far off and yet loud, like a hail through a speaking-trumpet. If he
makes a row we are lost, I thought to myself. This clearly was not a
case for fisticuffs, even apart from the very natural aversion I had
to beat that Shadow— this wandering and tormented thing. 'You
will be lost,' I said— 'utterly lost.' One gets sometimes such a flash
of inspiration, you know. I did say the right thing, though indeed
he could not have been more irretrievably lost dian he was at this
very moment, when the foundations of our intimacy were being
laid— to endure— to endure— even to the end— even beyond.

'"I had immense plans,' he muttered irresolutely. 'Yes,' said I;
'but if you try to shout I'll smash your head with—' there was not a
stick or a stone near. 'I will dirottle you for good,' I corrected
myself. 'I was on the threshold of great things,' he pleaded, in a
voice of longing, with a wistfulness of tone that made my blood
run cold. 'And now for this stupid scoundrel—' 'Your success in
Europe is assured in any case,' I affirmed, steadily. I did not want
to have the throttling of him, you understand— and indeed it would
have been very little use for any practical purpose. I tried to break
die spell— the heavy, mute spell of the wilderness— that seemed to
draw him to its pitiless breast by die awakening of forgotten and
brutal instincts, by die memory of gratified and monstrous
passions. This alone, I was convinced, had driven him out to die
edge of die forest, to die bush, towards the gleam of fires, the
throb of drums, die drone of weird incantations; this alone had
beguiled his unlawful soul beyond the bounds of permitted
aspirations. And, don't you see, the terror of the position was not
in being knocked on die head— though I had a very lively sense of
that danger too— but in this, that I had to deal with a being to
whom I could not appeal in the name of anything high or low. I
had, even like die niggers, to invoke him— himself— his own exalted
and incredible degradation. There was nothing either above or
below him, and I knew it. He had kicked himself loose of the
earth. Confound die man! he had kicked the very earth to pieces.
He was alone, and I before him did not know whether I stood on
die ground or floated in die air. I've been telling you what we
said— repeating the phrases we pronounced,— but what's the good?
They were common everyday words,— the familiar, vague sounds
exchanged on every waking day of life. But what of that? They had
behind them, to my mind, die terrific suggestiveness of words
heard in dreams, of phrases spoken in nightmares. Soul! If
anybody had ever struggled with a soul, I am the man. And I
wasn't arguing with a lunatic either. Believe me or not, his
intelligence was perfectly clear— concentrated, it is true, upon
himself with horrible intensity, yet clear; and therein was my only
chance— barring, of course, die killing him there and then, which

wasn't so good, on account of unavoidable noise. But his soul was
mad. Being alone in the wilderness, it had looked within itself,
and, by heavens! I tell; you, it had gone mad. I had— for my sins, I
suppose— to go through the ordeal of looking into it myself. No
eloquence could have been so withering to one's belief in
mankind as his final burst of sincerity. He struggled with himself,
too. I saw it,— I heard it. I saw the inconceivable mystery of a soul
that knew no restraint, no faith, and no fear, yet struggling blindly
with itself. I kept my head pretty well; but when I had him at last
stretched on the couch, I wiped my forehead, while my legs shook
under me as though I had carried half a ton on my back down that
hill. And yet I had only supported him, his bony arm clasped
round my neck— and he was not much heavier than a child.

"When next day we left at noon, die crowd, of whose presence
behind the curtain of trees I had been acutely conscious all the
time, flowed out of the woods again, filled the clearing, covered
the slope with a mass of naked, breathing, quivering, bronze
bodies. I steamed up a bit, then swung down-stream, and two
thousand eyes followed the evolutions of die splashing, diumping,
fierce river-demon beating die water with its terrible tail and
breathing black smoke into die air. In front of die first rank, along
the river, three men, plastered with bright red earth from head to
foot, strutted to and fro restlessly. When w r e came abreast again,
they faced the river, stamped dieir feet, nodded their horned
heads, swayed their scarlet bodies; they shook towards die fierce
river-demon a bunch of black feadiers, a mangy skin with a
pendent tail— something that looked like a dried gourd; they
shouted periodically togedier strings of amazing w r ords that
resembled no sounds of human language; and die deep murmurs
of the crcnvd, interrupted suddenly, were like die response of
some satanic litany.

"We had carried Kurtz into die pilot-house: there was more
air die re. Lying on the couch, he stared through the open shutter.
There was an eddy in the mass of human bodies, and the woman
with helmeted head and tawny cheeks rushed out to the very brink
of the stream. She put out her hands, shouted something, and all
that wild mob took up die shout in a roaring chorus of articulated,
rapid, breadiless utterance.

'"Do you understand this?' I asked.

"He kept on looking out past me with fiery, longing eyes, with
a mingled expression of wistfulness and hate. He made no answer,
but I saw a smile, a smile of indefinable meaning, appear on his
colorless lips that a moment after twitched convulsively. 'Do I
not?' he said slowly, gasping, as if the words had been torn out of
him by a supernatural power.

"I pulled die string of die wiiistie, and I did this because I saw
the pilgrims on deck getting out their rifles with an air of

anticipating a jolly lark. At the sudden screech there was a
movement of abject terror through that wedged mass of bodies.
'Don't! don't! you frighten them away,' cried someone on deck
disconsolately. I pulled the string time after time. They broke and
ran, diey leaped, they crouched, diey swerved, diey dodged the
flying terror of die sound. The three red chaps had fallen flat, face
down on die shore, as diough diey had been shot dead. Only the
barbarous and superb woman did not so much as flinch, and
stretched tragically her bare arms after us over die somber and
glittering river.

"And dien diat imbecile crowd down on the deck started their
litde fun, and I could see nothing more for smoke.

"The brown current ran swiftly out of die heart of darkness,
bearing us down towards the sea with twice the speed of our
upward progress; and Kurtz's life was running swiftly too, ebbing,
ebbing out of his heart into the sea of inexorable time. The
manager was very placid, he had no vital anxieties now, he took us
both in with a comprehensive and satisfied glance: die 'affair' had
come off as well as could be wished. I saw die time approaching
when I would be left alone of die party of 'unsound method.' The
pilgrims looked upon me with disfavor. I was, so to speak,
numbered with the dead. It is strange how I accepted this
unforeseen partnership, this choice of nightmares forced upon me
in the tenebrous land invaded by these mean and greedy phan-
toms.

"Kurtz discoursed. A voice! a voice! It rang deep to die very
last. It survived his strength to hide in the magnificent folds of
eloquence the barren darkness of his heart. Oh, he struggled! he
struggled! The wastes of his weary brain were haunted by shadowy
images now— images of wealth and fame revolving obsequiously
round his unextinguishable gift of noble and lofty expression. My
Intended, my station, my career, my ideas— these w r ere the subjects
for die occasional utterances of elevated sentiments. The shade of
the original Kurtz frequented the bedside of die hollow sham,
whose fate it was to be buried presently in die mold of primeval
eartii. But both the diabolic love and die unearthly hate of the
mysteries it had penetrated fought for die possession of that soul
satiated with primitive emotions, avid of lying fame, of sham dis-
tinction, of all the appearances of success and power.

"Sometimes he was contemptibly childish. He desired to have
kings meet him at railway-stations on his return from some ghastly
Nowhere, wiiere he intended to accomplish great things. 'You
show diem you have in you something that is really profitable, and
then there will be no limits to the recognition of your ability,' he
would say. 'Of course you must take care of the motives— right
motives— always.' The long reaches diat w r ere like one and the
same reach, monotonous bends diat were exactly alike, slipped

past the steamer with their multitude of secular trees looking
patiently after this grimy fragment of another world, the
forerunner of change, of conquest, of trade, of massacres, of
blessings. I looked ahead— piloting. 'Close the shutter,' said Kurtz
suddenly one day; 'I can't bear to look at this.' I did so. There was
a silence. 'Oh, but I will wring your heart yet!' he cried at the
invisible wilderness.

"We broke down— as I had expected— and had to lie up for
repairs at the head of an island. This delay was die first diing that
shook Kurtz's confidence. One morning he gave me a packet of
papers and a photograph,— die lot tied together with a shoe-string.
'Keep this for me,' he said. 'This noxious fool' (meaning the
manager) 'is capable of prying into my boxes when I am not
looking.' In die afternoon I saw him. He was lying on his back
with closed eyes, and I wididrew quiedy, but I heard him mutter,
'Live rightly, die, die . . . .' I listened. There was nodiing more.
Was he rehearsing some speech in his sleep, or was it a fragment
of a phrase from some newspaper article? He had been writing for
die papers and meant to do so again, 'for the furdiering of my
ideas. It's a duty.'

"His was an impenetrable darkness. I looked at him as you
peer down at a man who is lying at die bottom of a precipice
where the sun never shines. But I had not much time to give him,
because I was helping the engine-driver to take to pieces the leaky
cylinders, to straighten a bent connecting-rod, and in odier such
matters. I lived in an infernal mess of rust, filings, nuts, bolts,
spanners, hammers, ratchet-drills— tilings I abominate, because I
don't get on with them. I tended the little forge we fortunately had
aboard; I toiled wearily in a wretched scrap-heap— unless I had the
shakes too bad to stand.

"One evening coming in with a candle I was startled to hear
him say a little tremulously, 'I am lying here in the dark waiting for
death.' The light was within a foot of his eyes. I forced myself to
murmur, 'Oh, nonsense!' and stood over him as if transfixed.

"Anything approaching the change that came over his features
I have never seen before, and hope never to see again. Oh, I
wasn't touched. I was fascinated. It was as though a veil had been
rent. I saw on that ivory face the expression of somber pride, of
ruthless power, of craven terror— of an intense and hopeless
despair. Did he live his life again in every detail of desire,
temptation, and surrender during that supreme moment of
complete knowledge? He cried in a whisper at some image, at
some vision,— he cried out twice, a cry diat was no more than a
breath—

'"The horror! The horror!'

"I blew the candle out and left die cabin. The pilgrims were
dining in die mess-room, and I took my place opposite the

manager, who lifted his eyes to give me a questioning glance,
which I successfully ignored. He leaned back, serene, with that
peculiar smile of his sealing the unexpressed depths of his
meanness. A continuous shower of small flies streamed upon the
lamp, upon the cloth, upon our hands and faces. Suddenly the
manager's boy put his insolent black head in the doorway, and
said in a tone of scathing contempt—

"'Mistah Kurtz— he dead.'

"All the pilgrims rushed out to see. I remained, and went on
with my dinner. I believe I was considered brutally callous.
However, I did not eat much. There was a lamp in there— light,
don't you know— and outside it was so beastly, beastly dark. I went
no more near the remarkable man who had pronounced a
judgment upon the adventures of his soul on this earth. The voice
was gone. What else had been there? But I am of course aware
that next day the pilgrims buried something in a muddy hole.

"And then they very nearly buried me.

"However, as you see, I did not go to join Kurtz there and
then. I did not. I remained to dream the nightmare out to the end,
and to show my loyalty to Kurtz once more. Destiny. My destiny!
Droll tiling life is— that mysterious arrangement of merciless logic
for a futile purpose. The most you can hope from it is some
knowledge of yourself— that comes too late— a crop of
unextinguishable regrets. I have wrestled with death. It is the most
unexciting contest you can imagine. It takes place in an impalpable
grayness, with nothing underfoot, with nothing around, without
spectators, without clamor, without glory, without the great desire
of victory, without the great fear of defeat, in a sickly atmosphere
of tepid skepticism, without much belief in your own right, and
still less in that of your adversary. If such is the form of ultimate
wisdom, then life is a greater riddle than some of us think it to be.
I was within a hair's-breadth of the last opportunity for pro-
nouncement, and I found with humiliation that probably I would
have nothing to say. This is the reason why I affirm that Kurtz was
a remarkable man. He had something to say. He said it. Since I
had peeped over the edge myself, I understand better the meaning
of his stare, that could not see the flame of the candle, but was
wide enough to embrace the whole universe, piercing enough to
penetrate all the hearts that beat in the darkness. He had summed
up— he had judged. 'The horror!' He was a remarkable man. After
all, this was the expression of some sort of belief; it had candor, it
had conviction, it had a vibrating note of revolt in its wiiisper, it
had the appalling face of a glimpsed truth— the strange
commingling of desire and hate. And it is not my own extremity I
remember best— a vision of grayness without form filled with
physical pain, and a careless contempt for the evanescence of all
things— even of this pain itself. No! It is his extremity that I seem to

have lived through. True, he had made that last stride, he had
stepped over the edge, while I had been permitted to draw back
my hesitating foot. And perhaps in this is the whole difference;
perhaps all the wisdom, and all truth, and all sincerity, are just
compressed into that inappreciable moment of time in which we
step over the threshold of the invisible. Perhaps! I like to think my
summing-up would not have been a word of careless contempt.
Better his cry— much better. It was an affirmation, a moral victory
paid for by innumerable defeats, by abominable terrors, by
abominable satisfactions. But it was a victory! That is why I have
remained loyal to Kurtz to the last, and even beyond, when a long
time after I heard once more, not his own voice, but the echo of
his magnificent eloquence thrown to me from a soul as
translucently pure as a cliff of crystal.

"No, they did not bury me, though there is a period of time
which I remember mistily, with a shuddering wonder, like a
passage through some inconceivable world that had no hope in it
and no desire. I found myself back in the sepulchral city resenting
the sight of people hurrying through the streets to filch a little
money from each other, to devour tiieir infamous cookery, to gulp
their unwholesome beer, to dream tiieir insignificant and silly
dreams. They trespassed upon my thoughts. They were intruders
whose knowledge of life was to me an irritating pretense, because I
felt so sure they could not possibly know the things I knew. Their
bearing, which was simply the bearing of commonplace
individuals going about tiieir business in the assurance of perfect
safety, was offensive to me like the outrageous flauntings of folly in
the face of a danger it is unable to comprehend. I had no
particular desire to enlighten them, but I had some difficulty in
restraining myself from laughing in tiieir faces, so full of stupid
importance. I dare say I was not very well at that time. I tottered
about the streets— there were various affairs to settle— grinning
bitterly at perfectly respectable persons I admit my behavior was
inexcusable, but then my temperature was seldom normal in these
days. My dear aunt's endeavors to 'nurse up my strength' seemed
altogether beside the mark. It was not my strength that wanted
nursing, it was my imagination that wanted soothing. I kept the
bundle of papers given me by Kurtz, not knowing exactly what to
do with it. His mother had died lately, watched over, as I was told,
by his Intended. A clean-shaved man, with an official manner and
wearing gold-rimmed spectacles, called on me one day and made
inquiries, at first circuitous, afterwards suavely pressing, about what
he was pleased to denominate certain 'documents.' I was not
surprised, because I had had two rows with the manager on the
subject out there. I had refused to give up the smallest scrap out of
that package, and I took the same attitude with the spectacled
man. He became darkly menacing at last, and with much heat

argued that the Company had the right to every bit of information
about its 'territories.' And, said he, 'Mr. Kurtz's knowledge of
unexplored regions must have been necessarily extensive and
peculiar— owing to his great abilities and to the deplorable
circumstances in which he had been placed: therefore—' I assured
him Mr. Kurtz's knowledge, however extensive, did not bear upon
the problems of commerce or administration. He invoked then
the name of science. 'It would be an incalculable loss if,' &c, &c. I
offered him the report on the 'Suppression of Savage Customs,'
with the postscriptum torn off. He took it up eagerly, but ended by
sniffing at it with an air of contempt. 'This is not what we had a
right to expect,' he remarked. 'Expect nothing else,' I said. 'There
are only private letters.' He withdrew upon some threat of legal
proceedings, and I saw him no more; but another fellow, calling
himself Kurtz's cousin, appeared two days later, and was anxious
to hear all die details about his dear relative's last moments.
Incidentally he gave me to understand diat Kurtz had been
essentially a great musician. 'There was the making of an immense
success,' said the man, who was an organist, I believe, with lank
gray hair flowing over a greasy coat-collar. I had no reason to
doubt his statement; and to this day I am unable to say what was
Kurtz's profession, whether he ever had any— which was the
greatest of his talents. I had taken him for a painter who wrote for
the papers, or else for a journalist who could paint— but even the
cousin (who took snuff during the interview) could not tell me
what he had been exactly. He was a universal genius— on diat

point I agreed with the old chap, who thereupon blew his nose
noisily into a large cotton handkerchief and withdrew in senile
agitation, bearing off some family letters and memoranda widiout
importance. Ultimately a journalist anxious to know something of
the fate of his 'dear colleague' turned up. This visitor informed me
Kurtz's proper sphere ought to have been politics 'on the popular
side.' He had furry straight eyebrows, brisdy hair cropped short,
an eye-glass on a broad ribbon, and, becoming expansive,
confessed his opinion that Kurtz really couldn't write a bit— 'but
heavens! how r that man could talk! He electrified large meetings.
He had faith— don't you see?— he had die faith. He could get
himself to believe anything— anything. He w r ould have been a
splendid leader of an extreme party.' 'What party?' I asked. 'Any
party,' answered the other. 'He w r as an— an— extremist.' Did I not
think so? I assented. Did I know, he asked, with a sudden flash of
curiosity, 'what it was that had induced him to go out diere?' 'Yes,'
said I, and forthwith handed him the famous Report for
publication, if he thought fit. He glanced through it hurriedly,
mumbling all die time, judged 'it would do,' and took himself off
with diis plunder.

"Thus I was left at last widi a slim packet of letters and the

girl's portrait. She struck me as beautiful— I mean she had a
beautiful expression. I know that the sunlight can be made to lie
too, yet one felt that no manipulation of light and pose could have
conveyed the delicate shade of truthfulness upon those features.
She seemed ready to listen without mental reservation, without
suspicion, without a thought for herself. I concluded I would go
and give her back her portrait and those letters myself. Curiosity?
Yes; and also some other feeling perhaps. All that had been
Kurtz's had passed out of my hands: his soul, his body, his station,
his plans, his ivory, his career. There remained only his memory
and his Intended— and I wanted to give that up too to the past, in a
way,— to surrender personally all that remained of him with me to
that oblivion which is the last word of our common fate. I don't
defend myself. I had no clear perception of what it was I really
wanted. Perhaps it was an impulse of unconscious loyalty, or the
fulfillment of one of these ironic necessities that lurk in the facts of
human existence. I don't know. I can't tell. But I went.

"I thought his memory was like the other memories of the
dead that accumulate in every man's life,— a vague impress on the
brain of shadows that had fallen on it in their swift and final
passage; but before the high and ponderous door, between the tall
houses of a street as still and decorous as a well-kept alley in a
cemetery, I had a vision of him on the stretcher, opening his
mouth voraciously, as if to devour all the earth with all its
mankind. He lived then before me; he lived as much as he had
ever lived— a shadow insatiable of splendid appearances, of
frightful realities; a shadow darker than the shadow of the night,
and draped nobly in the folds of a gorgeous eloquence. The vision
seemed to enter the house with me— the stretcher, the phantom-
bearers, the wild crowd of obedient worshipers, the gloom of the
forests, the glitter of the reach between the murky bends the beat
of the drum, regular and muffled like the beating of a heart— the
heart of a conquering darkness. It was a moment of triumph for
the wilderness, an invading and vengeful rush which, it seemed to
me, I would have to keep back alone for the salvation of another
soul. And the memory of what I had heard him say afar there,
with the horned shapes stirring at my back, in the glow of fires,
within the patient woods, those broken phrases came back to me,
were heard again in their ominous and terrifying simplicity. I
remembered his abject pleading, his abject threats, the colossal
scale of his vile desires, the meanness, the torment, the tem-
pestuous anguish of his soul. And later on I seemed to see his
collected languid manner, when he said one day,

'This lot of ivory now is really mine. The Company did not
pay for it. I collected it myself at a very great personal risk. I am
afraid they will try to claim it as theirs though. H'm. It is a difficult
case. What do you think I ought to do— resist? Eh? I want no

more than justice.' . . . He wanted no more than justice— no more
than justice. I rang the bell before a mahogany door on the first
floor, and while I waited he seemed to stare at me out of the glassy
panel— stare with that wide and immense stare embracing,
condemning, loathing all the universe. I seemed to hear the
whispered cry, 'The horror! The horror!'

"The dusk was falling. I had to wait in a lofty drawing-room
with three long windows from floor to ceiling that were like three
luminous and bedraped columns. The bent gilt legs and backs of
the furniture shone in indistinct curves. The tall marble fireplace
had a cold and monumental whiteness. A grand piano stood mas-
sively in a corner, with dark gleams on the flat surfaces like a
somber and polished sarcophagus. A high door opened— closed. I
rose.

"She came forward, all in black, with a pale head, floating
towards me in the dusk. She was in mourning. It was more than a
year since his death, more than a year since die news came; she
seemed as though she would remember and mourn for ever. She
took botii my hands in hers and murmured, 'I had heard you
were coming.' I noticed she was not very young— I mean not
girlish. She had a mature capacity for fidelity, for belief, for
suffering. The room seemed to have grown darker, as if all die sad
light of die cloudy evening had taken refuge on her forehead. This
fair hair, diis pale visage, diis pure brow, seemed surrounded by
an ashy halo from which the dark eyes looked out at me. Their
glance was guileless, profound, confident, and trustful. She carried
her sorrowful head as diough she were proud of that sorrow, as
though she would say, I— I alone know how to mourn for him as
he deserves. But while we were still shaking hands, such a look of
awful desolation came upon her face that I perceived she was one
of those creatures diat are not the playthings of Time. For her he
had died only yesterday. And, by Jove! the impression was so
powerful that for me too he seemed to have died only yesterday-
nay, diis very minute. I saw her and him in die same instant of
time— his death and her sorrow— I saw her sorrow in the very
moment of his death. Do you understand? I saw them togedier— I
heard diem together. She had said, widi a deep catch of the
breadi, 'I have survived;' while my strained ears seemed to hear
distinctly, mingled with her tone of despairing regret, the
summing-up whisper of his eternal condemnation. I asked myself
what I was doing there, with a sensation of panic in my heart as
though I had blundered into a place of cruel and absurd mysteries
not fit for a human being to behold. She motioned me to a chair.
We sat down. I laid die packet gently on the little table, and she
put her hand over it. . . . 'You knew him well,' she murmured,
after a moment of mourning silence.

'"Intimacy grows quick out there,' I said. 'I knew him as well

as it is possible for one man to know another.'

'"And you admired him,' she said. 'It was impossible to know
him and not to admire him. Was it?'

'"He was a remarkable man,' I said, unsteadily. Then before
the appealing fixity of her gaze, that seemed to watch for more
words on my lips, I went on, 'It was impossible not to—'

'"Love him,' she finished eagerly, silencing me into an
appalled dumbness. 'How true! how true! But when you think that
no one knew him so well as I! I had all his noble confidence. I
knew him best.'

'"You knew him best,' I repeated. And perhaps she did. But
with every word spoken the room was growing darker, and only
her forehead, smooth and white, remained illumined by the
unextinguishable light of belief and love.

'"You were his friend,' she went on. 'His friend,' she repeated,
a litde louder. 'You must have been, if he had given you this, and
sent you to me. I feel I can speak to you— and oh! I must speak. I
want you— you who have heard his last words— to know I have
been worthy of him. ... It is not pride. . . . Yes! I am proud to
know I understood him better tiian anyone on eartii— he told me
so himself. And since his mother died I have had no one— no
one— to— to— '

"I listened. The darkness deepened. I was not even sure
whether he had given me die right bundle. I radier suspect he
wanted me to take care of another batch of his papers which, after
his death, I saw die manager examining under die lamp. And the
girl talked, easing her pain in the certitude of my sympathy; she
talked as diirsty men drink. I had heard that her engagement with
Kurtz had been disapproved by her people. He wasn't rich
enough or something. And indeed I don't know whether he had
not been a pauper all his life. He had given me some reason to
infer that it was his impatience of comparative poverty diat drove
him out diere.

'". . . Who was not his friend who had heard him speak once?'
she was saying. 'He drew men towards him by what was best in
them.' She looked at me with intensity. 'It is the gift of die great,'
she went on, and the sound of her low voice seemed to have the
accompaniment of all the other sounds, full of mystery,
desolation, and sorrow, I had ever heard— the ripple of die river,
the soughing of die trees swayed by the wind, die murmurs of wild
crowds, the faint ring of incomprehensible words cried from afar,
die whisper of a voice speaking from beyond the threshold of an
eternal darkness. 'But you have heard him! You know!' she cried.

'"Yes, I know,' I said with something like despair in my heart,
but bowing my head before die faith that was in her, before that
great and saving illusion that shone with an unearthly glow in the
darkness, in die triumphant darkness from which I could not have

defended her— from which I could not even defend myself.

'"What a loss to me— to us!'— she corrected herself with
beautiful generosity; then added in a murmur, 'To the world.' By
the last gleams of twilight I could see the glitter of her eyes, full of
tears— of tears that would not fall.

'"I have been very happy— very fortunate— very proud,' she
went on. 'Too fortunate. Too happy for a little while. And now I
am unhappy for— for life.'

"She stood up; her fair hair seemed to catch all the remaining
light in a glimmer of gold. I rose too.

'"And of all this,' she went on, mournfully, 'of all his promise,
and of all his greatness, of his generous mind, of his noble heart,
nothing remains— nothing but a memory. You and I—'

'"We shall always remember him,' I said, hastily.

"'No!' she cried. 'It is impossible that all this should be lost—
that such a life should be sacrificed to leave nothing— but sorrow.
You know what vast plans he had. I knew of them too— I could not
perhaps understand,— but others knew of them. Something must
remain. His words, at least, have not died.'

" 'His words will remain,' I said.

'"And his example,' she whispered to herself. 'Men looked up
to him,— his goodness shone in every act. His example—'

"'True,' I said; 'his example too. Yes, his example. I forgot
that.'

'"But I do not. I cannot— I cannot believe— not yet. I cannot
believe that I shall never see him again, that nobody will see him
again, never, never, never.'

"She put out her arms as if after a retreating figure, stretching
them black and with clasped pale hands across the fading and
narrow sheen of the window. Never see him! I saw him clearly
enough then. I shall see this eloquent phantom as long as I live,
and I shall see her too, a tragic and familiar Shade, resembling in
this gesture another one, tragic also, and bedecked with powerless
charms, stretching bare brown arms over the glitter of the infernal
stream, the stream of darkness. She said suddenly very low, 'He
died as he lived.'

'"His end,' said I, with dull anger stirring in me, 'was in every
way worthy of his life.'

'"And I was not with him,' she murmured. My anger subsided
before a feeling of infinite pity.

"'Everything that could be done—' I mumbled.

'"All, but I believed in him more than anyone on earth— more
than his own mother, more than— himself. He needed me! Me! I
would have treasured every sigh, every word, every sign, every
glance.'

"I felt like a chill grip on my chest. 'Don't,' I said, in a muffled
voice.

'"Forgive me. I— I— have mourned so long in silence— in
silence. . . . You were with him— to the last? I think of his lone-
liness. Nobody near to understand him as I would have
understood. Perhaps no one to hear. . . .'

"'To die very end,' I said, shakily. 'I heard his very last words.
. . .' I stopped in a fright.

'"Repeat them,' she said in a heart-broken tone. 'I want— I
want— something— something— to— to live with.'

"I was on the point of crying at her, 'Don't you hear diem?'
The dusk was repeating them in a persistent whisper all around us,
in a whisper that seemed to swell menacingly like the first, whisper
of a rising wind. 'The horror! the horror! '

'"His last word— to live with,' she murmured. 'Don't you
understand I loved him— I loved him— I loved him!'

"I pulled myself togedier and spoke slowly.

'"The last word he pronounced was— your name.'

"I heard a light sigh, and then my heart stood still, stopped
dead short by an exulting and terrible cry, by die cry of
inconceivable triumph and of unspeakable pain. 'I knew it— I was
sure!' . . . She knew. She was sure. I heard her weeping; she had
hidden her face in her hands. It seemed to me diat the house
would collapse before I could escape, diat die heavens would fall
upon my head. But nothing happened. The heavens do not fall
for such a trifle. Would they have fallen, I wonder, if I had
rendered Kurtz diat justice which was his due? Hadn't he said he
wanted only justice? But I couldn't. I could not tell her. It would
have been too dark— too dark altogether. ..."

Marlow ceased, and sat apart, indistinct and silent, in the pose
of a meditating Buddha. Nobody moved for a time. "We have lost
the first of die ebb," said die Director, suddenly. I raised my head.
The offing was barred by a black bank of clouds, and the tranquil
waterway leading to the uttermost ends of the eardi flowed somber
under an overcast sky— seemed to lead into the heart of an
immense darkness.